NAJAF, Iraq – Iraq’s top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, made a dramatic return to Najaf on Thursday and swiftly won agreement from a rebel cleric and the government to end three weeks of fighting between his militia and U.S.-Iraqi forces.
The renegade Muqtada al-Sadr accepted the proposal in a face-to-face meeting Thursday night with the 75-year-old al-Sistani. Hours afterward, Iraq’s interim government also agreed to the deal.
The five-point plan called for Najaf and Kufa to be declared weapons-free cities, for all foreign forces to withdraw from Najaf, for police to be in charge of security, and for the government to compensate those harmed by the fighting.
Al-Sistani’s highly publicized, 11th-hour peace mission would almost certainly boost his already high prestige in Iraq and cloak him in a statesman’s mantle, showing that only he had the ability to force an accord between two sides that loathe each other.
The influential cleric returned to Iraq after heart treatment in London to intervene for the first time in the bloody conflict, drawing thousands of followers who marched on Najaf and massed on its outskirts.
Fighting eased in Najaf after al-Sistani arrived, and the U.S. military and the Iraqi government called a 24-hour ceasefire.
Other developments in Iraq on Thursday:
* An Arab television station said it received a video showing the killing of kidnapped Italian journalist Enzo Baldoni, whom militants had threatened to execute if Italy did not withdraw from Iraq. Italy condemned the killing but said it would not pull out its troops.
* A mortar barrage slammed into a Kufa mosque filled with Shiites preparing to join a peace march for Najaf, killing 27 people. It was the fourth violent incident in the ancient city of Kufa in two days, after three attacks on other Shiite rallies. A total of at least 40 people have been killed.
* Saboteurs attacked about 20 oil pipelines in southern Iraq late Wednesday, reducing exports from the key oil producing region at least by half, an official with the state-run South Oil Co. said.
U.S. military deaths
Latest identifications reported by the military of U.S. personnel killed in Iraq:
Marine Lance Cpl. Jacob Lugo, 21, Flower Mound, Texas; killed Tuesday in Anbar province; assigned to 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine Palms, Calif.
Marine Lance Cpl. Alexander Arredondo, 20, Randolph, Mass.; killed Wednesday in Najaf; assigned to Battalion Landing Team 1/4, 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit (Special Operations Capable), I Marine Expeditionary Force, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Calif.
U.S. military deaths
Latest identifications reported by the military of U.S. personnel killed in Iraq:
Marine Lance Cpl. Jacob Lugo, 21, Flower Mound, Texas; killed Tuesday in Anbar province; assigned to 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine Palms, Calif.
Marine Lance Cpl. Alexander Arredondo, 20, Randolph, Mass.; killed Wednesday in Najaf; assigned to Battalion Landing Team 1/4, 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit (Special Operations Capable), I Marine Expeditionary Force, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Calif.
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