Shiites in Baghdad protest planned US-Iraq pact

Followers of A-Sadr oppose continued presence of U.S. forces in Iraq

AP

BAGHDAD. Chanting and waving flags, thousands of followers of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr filled a central Baghdad square Friday to protest a proposed U. S. -Iraqi security pact that would allow American troops to stay for three more years.

After a mass prayer, demonstrators pelted an effigy of President George W. Bush with plastic water bottles and sandals.

The effigy was placed on the same pedestal where U.S. Marines toppled a statue of Saddam Hussein in one of the iconic images of the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Before the effigy fell, it held a sign that said: "The security agreement... shame and humiliation."

Iraq's parliament is expected to vote next week on the plan to keep U.S. forces in Iraq for another three years. But the noisy opposition by the Sadrists indicates that even if it is approved, the deal could remain divisive in a country struggling for reconciliation.

Opponents view the security deal as a surrender to U.S. interests despite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, saying the pact would eventually lead to full sovereignty.

Al-Sadr, believed to be in Iran, was not at the protest, though he wrote a sermon read by his representative, Sheik Abdul Hadi al-Mohammadawi, calling the U.S. "the enemy of Islam."

"The government must know that it is the people who help it in the good and the bad times. If it throws the occupier out all the Iraqi people will stand by it," the sermon read, using common rhetoric for the United States.

Al-Sadr reiterated in the sermon that his followers in both the armed and the peaceful factions of his movement will continue to work for the removal of U.S. forces.

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