Iraqis protest Al-Hawza closure; Bremer vows on Fallujah event

By: Hamoud Kufi

BAGHDAD, Iraq: Thousands of angry Iraqis waving Iraqi flags took to the streets of Baghdad for the fourth consecutive day to protest a decision by the US-led coalition to close the weekly newspaper of cleric Moqtada As-Sadr, while US overseer Paul Bremer a day after four American civilians were burned to death and their bodies dismembered vowed the deaths would be avenged.

On Sunday March 28, the coalition served Al-Hawza An-Natiqa an injunction signed by Bremer shutting it down for 60 days for publishing articles “that prove an intention to disturb general security and incite violence against the coalition and its employees”.

A coalition spokesman speaking on condition of anonymity said any violation of the closure could lead to the imprisonment of newspaper employees for up to one year and a fine of up to $1,000 US.

In Fallujah, police retrieved the remains of the four slain Americans on Wednesday night, wrapped them in blankets and gave them to US forces, said Iraqi police officer Lieut. Salah Abdullah. “We were shocked because our Islamic beliefs reject such behaviour,” he said referring to the abuse of the bodies.

Meanwhile, The Washington Post reported on Thursday US national security adviser Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to deliver a major policy speech on Sept. 11, 2001, that focused on missile defense, not terrorism. Citing former US officials who have seen the text, the newspaper said the speech was designed to promote missile defense as the cornerstone of President Bush's administration's national security and contained no mention of al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden or extremist groups.

Separately, a newspaper publisher Khaled Abdel-Latif Dumeisi who spied on Iraqi dissidents in the US for the regime of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was sentenced to 46 months in jail.

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