Baghdad Shi'ites protest "US siege" of stronghold

BAGHDAD, Oct 31 (Reuters) Shops were shut and many workers stayed at home today in the Baghdad Shi'ite stronghold of Sadr City after a local militia leader ordered protests at what he called a US military ''siege'' of the sprawling slum suburb.

For the past week, Iraqi and US troops have been manning checkpoints and mounting raids in the area, home to some two million people, in the hunt for an American soldier of Iraqi origin who was kidnapped in central Baghdad last Monday.

''The Sadr office has ordered all government employees to stay at home and shops to close in protest at the US siege of Sadr City,'' said Mohammed al-Kaabi, a spokesman for the office of Shi'ite cleric and militia leader Moqtada al-Sadr.

Reuters journalists in the area said there were few cars on the streets and most shops and businesses were shut. Some bakeries selling bread and essential items were open.

The US military said Iraqi special forces detained three people in Sadr City early today. ''The purpose of the mission was to search for the missing US soldier and to capture the leadership of a kidnapping cell reported to have knowledge of the soldier's location,'' it said in a statement.

Sadr, a powerful, anti-American figure within the Shi'ite bloc that dominates Iraq's government, commands the Mehdi Army. It is a nationwide movement that controls police and much else in Sadr City and which is blamed by the US military and minority Sunni leaders for kidnappings and death squad killings.

Other groups, described by US and Iraqi officials as ''rogue'' Mehdi Army elements not under Sadr's control, are also active there.

Among these is a warlord known as Abu Deraa, who Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said was the target of an abortive US raid in Sadr City last week that killed 10 people.

Maliki was angered by the raid, which he said failed to capture Abu Deraa. It was one of several causes of friction between his government and Washington, which is pressing him to disband militias like the Mehdi Army, led by fellow Shi'ites.

The military has not identified the missing soldier, whom it has described as a ''linguist'', but Maliki told Reuters last week his name was Ahmed al-Taie and that he was snatched in the commercial Karrada district during a visit to relatives.

The New York Times yesterday quoted people who named Taie and said they were his relatives. They believed the kidnappers were from the Mehdi Army. They told the paper Taie had married a fellow Sunni Muslim this year and visited her frequently.

US military regulations forbid troops from marrying local people in areas of conflict.

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