Clashes in southern Iraqi city kill 5, wound 17

Samawa (Iraq), Dec 23: Clashes between Iraqi security forces and Shi'ite militiamen loyal to cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have left five people dead and wounded 17 others in the usually calm city of Samawa, police sources said today.

The sources said that the fighting began yesterday afternoon when Sadr's armed followers protested against the continuous detention of their comrades by the police.

Four of the dead were policemen.

The city is now under full curfew preventing movement of vehicles and pedestrians in an attempt to calm the sudden rise of violence.

Samawa, a small Shi'ite city generally considered to be a world apart from the violence gripping central Iraq, was the first Iraqi province to be officially handed back to Iraqi control from the US-led occupation of the country.

But clashes, resulting from tense political stand-offs between Sadr's movement and the local authorities, have broken out on a number of occasions since the handover.

REUTERS