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Tuesday, July 17, 2007

U.S. takes on Iran-backed militia in Baghdad

BAGHDAD — The U.S. military has launched an offensive against militias financed and trained by Iran.

Over the weekend, U.S. Army units raided an Iranian-sponsored Shi'ite insurgency stronghold in central Baghdad, Middle East Newsline reported. Officials said the operation with the Iraqi police targeted an Iraqi police lieutenant suspected of leading the Shi'ite cell, termed the Special Groups, which planned attacks on U.S. forces throughout Baghdad.

"When they went to arrest this lieutenant, some of the police who were with him began firing on our folks," Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said. "That turned those individuals into enemy and legitimate folks for our troops to take on in combat."

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Officials said Special Groups accumulated hundreds of Iranian rockets and mortars manufactured in Iran. They said Shi'ite insurgents have been firing rockets and mortars from east Baghdad toward the Green Zone, which contains the U.S. embassy and Iraqi government.

In a July 13 gunbattle, six Iraqi police and seven Shi'ite insurgents were killed. The U.S. military deployed helicopters to fire missiles toward the Shi'ite stronghold and arrested the police lieutenant.

"The close air support was directed in front of the Iraqi police, not at them, to prevent further casualties," the military said.

The military said the unidentified Iraqi police officer led a unit of the Special Groups in Baghdad. The Special Groups was said to have been sponsored by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as part of Teheran's attempt to undermine stability and attack the U.S.-led coalition.

IRGC's Quds Force was said to have been responsible for the funding and arming of Shi'ite insurgents in central and southern Baghdad. The Special Groups was said to have been trained by the Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah, based in Lebanon.

Officials said many Shi'ite officers in the Iraqi police have been working for Iranian-sponsored militias. They said the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki has protected Shi'ite militias and often vetoed U.S. operations against the Iranian-backed Mahdi Army.

"The fact of the matter is that there are elements of the Iraqi police and elements of the Iraqi army that are infiltrated, and the Iraqi government is working very hard to work their way through that," Pace said.

U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, commander of Multinational Division Center and the 3rd Infantry Division, said his troops have found numerous rocket-propelled grenades and other ordnance manufactured by Iran. Lynch said this included explosive-formed-penetrator munitions with Iranian markings.

Lynch said the Iranian ordnance has been transported by Iran to Iraq by truck. He said the entry point for the ordnance has been Iraq's Wasit province, and recipients were Shi'ite groups.

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