Militant Stronghold Seized in Basra

21 April 2008

Iraqi officials say Iraqi troops have taken control of an area in the southern city of Basra formerly held by Islamic militants.

An Iraqi national police officer distributes the Baghdad Now newspaper while on patrol with U.S. Army Soldiers assigned to the 10th Mountain Division's Company C, 2nd Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment.

Military officials Saturday said forces seized the Hayaniya neighborhood, a stronghold of the Mahdi Army militia loyal to radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

A British military spokesman, Major Tom Holloway, said British artillery and U.S. warplanes launched shells and dropped bombs in an unoccupied area, west of the neighborhood, in support of Iraqi troops. He said the intent was to show militants the firepower available to the Iraqi Army.

A spokesman for Iraq's Interior Ministry, Major General Abdel Karim Khalaf, said the area is now calm.

No casualty figures were immediately available.

Elsewhere in Baghdad's Sadr City, reports say at least 12 people were killed in heavy fighting during pre-dawn clashes between Shi'ite militiamen and U.S.-backed Iraqi forces.

In a bid to stem the violence in the area, U.S. forces are building a massive concrete wall along a road, Al-Quds Street, that cuts through Sadr City.

And at least one militant was killed when Iraqi troops and members of the Mahdi Army clashed in the southern city of Nasiriyah.