By Xinhua
Baghdad : Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki on Saturday said some militias of his Shiite sect was worse than al-Qaida terrorists, while the Mahdi Army militants refused to give up.
“Unfortunately, when we were talking about al-Qaida, among us there are those who are worse than al-Qaida,” he said at a meeting with tribal leaders in Basra which was broadcast by the state broadcaster al-Iraqiya.
He elaborated that “al-Qaida are killing innocent people and destroying installations and those gunmen are doing so. Al-Qaida elements want to see the failure of the political process and they are planning for that, too.”
“Those (militiamen) want what the al-Qaida wants, so we are facing another danger which comes from among us,” he said.
The Mahdi Army, which is loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtadaal-Sadr, accuses Maliki of targeting the Sadrists for political reasons.
Maliki, who has been in Basra since Monday to oversee a major offensive by Iraqi security forces dubbed “Operation Cavalry Assault” with the aim of restoring order in the city where instability is spreading, dismissed the notion that the campaign is politically motivated.
“We came to Basra to fight outlaws and smugglers. We did not come to confront a party or some political bloc. We do not seek a political face-off,” he said.
On Wednesday, Maliki gave the militants in Basra 72 hours to surrender their weapons. He said on Friday that, until April 8, those who hand in their heavy and medium weapons can receive financial rewards.
However, the prime minister has dismissed the chance of negotiating with “criminal gangs,” vowing to “fight to the end.”
On Saturday, the Mahdi Army insisted that it will not surrender despite a government ultimatum which ended on Friday.
“The sons of Sadr movement renew their rejection to hand over their weapons in this stage as the occupiers are still in our country,” Shiek Ali al-Sa’id, an aide to the head of Sadr office in Basra told Xinhua.
“Since the first day of occupation we have opposed the occupiers and took our weapons against them. This is a religious and patriotic stance demanded from all Iraqis,” he said, “We will hand over our weapons as soon as the occupation leave Iraq and under an sovereign Iraqi government.”
The five-day clash has claimed more than 120 lives in Basra with some 500 people wounded, according to a local security source.
Sadr pull out his ministers from the cabinet last year, mainly because Maliki’s government rejected his demand of expelling foreign troops.
Basra, some 500 km south of Baghdad, is Iraq’s second largest city and one of the most important oil production and export region.