Political pressure on Sadr mounts in Iraq

AP/USA Today:

Iraq's major Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish parties have closed ranks to pressure anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr into disbanding his Mahdi Army militia or be barred from political life, lawmakers and officials involved in the effort said Sunday.

They said a first step would be to add language to a draft election bill banning parties that operate militias from fielding candidates in provincial balloting this fall.

"We want the Sadrists to disband the Mahdi Army. Just freezing it is no longer acceptable," said Sadiq al-Rikabi, a senior adviser to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. "The new election law will prevent any party that has weapons or runs a militia from contesting elections."

Such a bold move risks a violent backlash by the Mahdi militia. If it succeeds, however, it would mark a major realignment of Iraq's political landscape.

U.S. officials have been pressing Iraq's government for years to disband the militias, including the Mahdi Army. All major political parties are believed to maintain links to armed groups, and previous efforts to disband them have failed.

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Broad outlines of the strategy to combat the militias were made public late Saturday in a statement by the Political Council for National Security, a top leadership body including the national president, prime minister and leaders of major parties in parliament.

The statement called on parties to disband their militias or face a political ban. Although the statement did not mention the Sadrists, the intent was clear.

President Jalal Talabani said Sunday that the statement was adopted after "heated, cordial, frank and transparent discussion" and that the two Sadrist lawmakers who attended Saturday's meeting objected to the call for militias to disband.

One of the Sadrists who attended, lawmaker Hassan al-Rubaie, confirmed Talabani's account and said "our political isolation was very clear and real during the meeting."

"We, the Sadrists, are in a predicament," he said Sunday. "Even the blocs that had in the past supported us are now against us and we cannot stop them from taking action against us in parliament."

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The hardline stand against al-Sadr represents a major shift in Shiite politics.

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Those who claim that Sadr has some political victory coming out to the Basra fight appear to be mistaken. He appears to have brought the various factions of the Iraqi government together in opposition to his organization. His threat of a million man march appears to have backfired.

This will also throw off a line of attack the Democrats probably had planed for this weeks report by Gen. Petraeus.

CNN reports that 2o killed in fighting in Sadr city. They do not say which side. I decode this to mean they were from the Mahdi militia since they usually disclose US casualties. It is a continuing problem of media war reports in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is like giving the combined score of a game in the final four and not saying who won the game. Again I think this comes from an over reliance on the violence metric instead of reporting the out come of the violence.

Update: The Times confirms that the 22 killed were Sadr forces. " US and Iraqi forces killed 22 people yesterday in a raid on the Baghdad stronghold of al-Mahdi Army, the Shia militia that fought Iraqi government forces in Basra last week...."