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Sporadic fire in Baghdad, Saddam due back in court

Posted on: Wednesday, 1 March 2006, 04:01 CST

By Alastair Macdonald and Aseel Kami

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Mortar and gunfire kept Baghdad on edge overnight on Wednesday after a bloody day of sectarian attacks when U.S. President George W. Bush told Iraqis to choose between "chaos and unity" but dismissed talk of civil war.

Saddam Hussein was due to return to court for a second day of prosecution evidence; prosecutors presented on Tuesday what they said was a death warrant signed by Saddam for 148 Shi'ite men. The former leader, who staged a hunger strike during the two-week recess, was subdued. The judge ruled out some evidence.

There were no immediate reports of casualties but residents heard sporadic explosions and firing across the city.

In the week since explosives demolished the Golden Mosque in Samarra, one of the holiest sites in Shi'ite Islam, sectarian violence has killed over 400 people by government reckoning, pitching Iraq toward a civil war that would inflame the Middle East and might thwart Bush's hopes of withdrawing U.S. troops.

As Saddam was about to appear on Tuesday, three bombs in quick succession killed 32 people. Later, a car bomb killed at least 23 near the Shi'ite mosque. In all, over 60 died in the city, where some have fled hostile neighborhoods and others have thrown up barricades and mounted guards on their streets.

"The choice is chaos or unity," said Bush. The ruling Shi'ites warned sectarian bloodshed could mean months of delay to bringing Sunnis into the national unity government that Washington is pushing hard as a solution to the violence.

GOVERNMENT TENSIONS

Among other complicating factors, discontent among other parties with the Shi'ites' choice of Ibrahim al-Jaafari to stay on as prime minister in any coalition, is becoming apparent.

President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, openly criticized Jaafari on Tuesday for making a visit to Turkey. And complaints have surfaced from fellow Shi'ite officials about the government's failure to prevent the Samarra attack, blamed on al Qaeda.

A senior security official confirmed he had warned of such attacks and senior government sources criticized Jaafari's cabinet for, they said, ignoring the threat in Samarra; four of the shrine guards are being held as suspects.

Security chiefs say they are puzzled why Sunni extremists from al Qaeda would spare the lives of all the mosque guards, who were tied up for hours while explosives were meticulously planted before the dawn blast last Wednesday.

Militant groups have accused Shi'ite leaders of setting the explosion to justify reprisal attacks on Sunnis.

BUSH POLLS

Bush, hit by polls showing domestic support for the war at an all-time low, denied Iraq was sliding into civil war, despite the worst crisis since the U.S. invasion three years ago.

Asked what Washington would do if civil war broke out in Iraq, he told ABC television: "I don't buy your premise that there's going to be a civil war."

His job performance rating fell to 34 percent, the lowest CBS News poll numbers of his presidency, eight months before congressional elections. The same CBS poll showed public approval for Bush's handling of Iraq, once among his strongest suits, falling to 30 percent from 37 percent in January.

Sixty-two percent of Americans said they thought U.S. efforts to bring order to Iraq were going badly, up from 54 percent in January, compared with 36 percent who said things were going well, a drop from 45 percent.

Raising questions about Bush's vow to keep troops in Iraq as long as they are needed, a Le Moyne College/Zogby poll showed 72 percent of U.S. troops serving there think the United States should exit within the next year.

Nearly one in four said the troops should leave immediately.

A U.S. military intelligence chief called the situation "very tenuous" but not yet civil war: "I believe that the underlying conditions are present, but that we are not involved in a civil war at this time," Defense Intelligence Agency head Lieutenant General Michael Maples told a Senate committee.

Bush has made withdrawal of 136,000 U.S. troops conditional on the stability he says a non-sectarian government can bring. For now, the heavily armed Americans are holding the line behind untested, U.S.-trained Iraqi forces against sectarian militias.

Though Iraqis across the sectarian divided are largely united in resenting the U.S. troop presence, many recognize the forces are helping keep a lid on violence.

Washington has assured Iraqis of support for as long as it is needed.

U.S. officials said on Tuesday, however, that the State Department is winding down its $20 billion reconstruction program, one of several U.S. engagements in Iraq; the only new rebuilding money in its latest budget request is for prisons.

(Additional reporting by Lutfi Abu Oun)

Source: REUTERS

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