CNN - Baghdad on lockdown as rockets, bombs fly

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Baghdad on lockdown as rockets, bombs fly

Baghdad was on virtual lockdown Friday as a tough new curfew ordered everyone off the streets of the Iraqi capital and five other cities until 5 p.m. Sunday.

That restriction didn't stop someone from firing rockets and mortar rounds into the capital's heavily fortified International Zone, commonly known as the Green Zone. One slammed into the office of one of Iraq's vice presidents, Tareq al-Hashemi, killing two guards.

An American government worker also was killed in rocket and mortar attacks Thursday in the International Zone.

U.S. warplanes pounded Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood Friday, killing six people and wounding 10.

Other U.S. planes bombed Shiite militia positions overnight in the southern city of Basra, a British military spokesman said.

The British military said the firings were the first by coalition forces since the Iraqi army launched an operation Tuesday in Basra, Iraq's second largest city.

At least 120 militia fighters have been killed and 240 wounded in Basra since the military operation started, said an Iraqi Defense Ministry official on condition of anonymity.

Iraq's parliament called a special session for Friday to address the crisis. The Interior Ministry on Thursday imposed a curfew through the weekend in Baghdad, Hilla, Kut, Diwaniya, Simawa and Basra. Officials banned pedestrian, motorcycle and vehicular traffic through 5 a.m. Sunday (10 p.m. ET Saturday.)

Meanwhile, the Iraqi government on Friday offered cash to people who surrender medium and heavy weapons by April 8.

New clashes erupted Friday in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriya, a stronghold of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, killing at least four people, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official said.

Thousands of al-Sadr's supporters took to the streets in Sadr City and another Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad to protest the crackdown launched by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in Basra this week. The protesters called al-Maliki the country's "new dictator" and demanded his dismissal.

The fighting threatens to end al-Sadr's seven-month-long suspension of his Mehdi Army militia, regarded as a key factor in Iraq's dramatic drop in violence in recent months. The cleric, whose militia launched two uprisings against U.S. troops in 2004, has kept his cease-fire edict in place for now, but his supporters accuse the government of singling them out for raids by security forces in recent weeks.

In Baghdad, the U.S. Embassy warned employees to remain indoors until there's an end to the rocket and mortar fire.

U.S. State Department official Richard Schmierer said the rocket attacks appeared to be coming from fighters affiliated with al-Sadr who were "trying to make a statement" about the government offensive in Basra. He blamed the violence on "marginal extremist elements" who have associated themselves with the Sadrist movement.

In Friday's special session, lawmakers were to discuss the security situation around the country, specifically in Basra, where al-Maliki was leading operations against what government officials called "rogue" or "outlaw" militia elements.

President Bush on Friday praised the Iraqi government's military push into Basra as "a defining moment in the history of a free Iraq," saying the regime is fighting criminals.

"It was just a matter of time before the government was going to have to deal with it," he said, emphasizing that the decision to mount the offensive was al-Maliki's.

The operation is an effort to restore order amid disputes among the Sadrists, the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq and the Fadhila Party. The fighting has been concentrated in areas controlled by al-Sadr's supporters and has spread north to Baghdad and other cities.

Al-Maliki's guns-for-cash program was an attempt to stem the violence.

"We call on all those who hold medium and heavy weapons to surrender their weapons to the security forces in exchange for cash award starting from March 28th until April 8, 2008," al-Maliki said in a statement.

It follows a call by al-Sadr to end the fighting.

"Muqtada al-Sadr calls on all groups to adopt a political situation and peaceful protest and to stop shedding Iraqi blood," senior aide Hazem al-Araji said.

Meanwhile, Iraqi security forces and U.S. soldiers killed eight militants after an attack on an Iraqi army checkpoint Thursday in northern Baghdad, a military statement said. One Iraqi soldier died and seven were wounded.

The militants hit the checkpoint with rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire, according to the military, and coalition forces responded with an airstrike that killed the eight.

American military operations targeting al Qaeda in Iraq killed eight suspected terrorists in northern Iraq on Thursday and led to the detention of 17 people, the U.S. military said.

The operations focused on al Qaeda in Iraq's "propaganda network" in the Tuz, Samarra and Mosul areas, the military said.