http://in.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2007-04-07T070830Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_India-293355-4.xmlIraqi, U.S. forces sweep through volatile Iraqi city
Sat Apr 7, 2007
DIWANIYA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi and U.S. forces clashed with Shi'ite militia loyal to the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on Friday in a dawn operation aimed at returning the volatile city of Diwaniya to government control.
In Ramadi, west of Baghdad, a truck bomb killed at least 10 people and wounded 24 in the latest in a string of attacks that have spewed poisonous chlorine gas into the air, three Iraqi police officers said. A fourth officer put the toll at 35 dead.
The Iraqi government said this week it was extending a seven-week-old U.S.-Iraqi security crackdown in Baghdad to other cities as it seeks to halt the slide to sectarian civil war.
While the crackdown has succeeded in reducing the murder rate in Baghdad, the government says militants forced out of the capital have turned other areas into new "killing fields".Iraqi and U.S. troops fought militiamen in southeast Diwaniya, a stronghold of Sadr's Mehdi Army, which the Pentagon says poses the greatest threat to peace in Iraq. The head of Sadr's office in the city blamed rogue gunmen.
Pamphlets dropped by U.S. helicopters warned police, who are suspected of being infiltrated by the militia, to stay off the streets. Any found carrying weapons would be shot.
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