Prominent Sadr aide arrested in Baghdad

Baghdad, Jan 19: Iraqi and US forces seized a prominent follower of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in Baghdad today, a Sadr aide said, and the US military described the man arrested as a senior death squad leader.

In a statement, the military did not name the man but said he was linked to Abu Deraa, a high-profile fugitive leader who is accused of running death squads and who claims loyalty to the Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

An official in Sadr's political office, however, said the man detained was Abdul-Hadi al-Darraji, a prominent media spokesman for the movement. ''He was arrested at midnight (0230 HRS IST) with two cousins,'' Abdul-Mehdi al-Matiri told Reuters.

Matiri said a guard was shot dead during the arrest and that he believed the two others detained had since been released.

The US statement made no mention of any violence and US officials had no immediate comment. Though the statement did not identify Darraji, details of the operation given by the US military coincided with those given by Sadr's office.

Senior Shi'ite officials close to Prime Minister Nuri al- Maliki's government say US and Iraqi forces are mounting a campaign to seize leaders in the movement in an effort to quell sectarian violence that is pushing Iraq toward civil war.

A senior figure in the movement was shot dead by a US soldier during a raid the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf last month.

The US military said: ''In an Iraqi-led operation, special Iraqi army forces captured a high-level, illegal armed group leader during operations with Coalition advisers.'' It said he was suspected of leading ''punishment'' activities -- an apparent reference to informal courts meting out rough justice according strict interpretations of Islamic law. These included ''kidnapping, torture and murder''.

Matiri said: ''We are angry. This is a kind of revenge.

Sheikh Darraji deals with the media. He is not a military man.'' He said the US forces were trying to provoke the movement into a violent response but added: ''We will not retaliate.'' Maliki, a Shi'ite Islamist, partly owes his position to support from Sadr's political movement and has been criticised by Washington for failing to disarm the Mehdi Army.

As he and US commanders prepare to deploy Iraqi and American reinforcements in a major security crackdown in Baghdad, Maliki has promised to quell Shi'ite militias as well as Sunni insurgents. He said this week that some 400 Mehdi Army members had been arrested in recent days in southern Iraq.

Sadr himself, a populist young preacher with a mass following, has publicly distanced himself from violence blamed on his Mehdi Army supporters, whom the United States has called the biggest threat to the security of Iraq.

Fellow Shi'ite leaders say they are negotiating to keep Sadr and his political movement inside the main Shi'ite bloc while at the same time they hope to disarm his militia followers.

Reuters