This may be a victory for those who want peace!
Radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr accepted a peace plan Wednesday for Najaf that would disarm his militiamen and remove them from a holy shrine where they are hiding out, according to a spokesman. However, Al-Sadr wanted to negotiate how the deal would be implemented...
The cleric's decision came just hours after Iraqi Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan said the government was prepared to raid the revered Imam Ali shrine as early as Wednesday to root out the militants.
The agreement could spell the end of the two-week resurgence of violence in this holy city that enraged many of the country's majority Shiites and posed the greatest test yet for the fledgling government of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.
The cease-fire deal was presented to al-Sadr's aides in Najaf on Tuesday by an eight-person delegation sent by the Iraqi National Conference, meeting in Baghdad. Al-Sadr himself declined to meet with the mediators. The proposal demanded the cleric's militia drop its arms, withdraw from the shrine and transform itself into a political party in exchange for amnesty...."
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/sns-ap-iraq,0,2013744,print.story?coll=ny-top-headlines
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