Iraqi held for ambush on US
2003-12-04 10:35
Baghdad - A deputy of a firebrand Iraqi Shi'ite leader has been arrested in Baghdad in connection with the killing of two US soldiers in October, a US general said Wednesday.
"Coalition forces in Baghdad conducted a joint raid with the Iraqi Civil Defence Corps and detained Amar al-Yasseri, operations director of Moqtada Sadr in Sadr City, also believed to have been behind the ambush of coalition troops on October 9," Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt told a press conference.
Yasseri was captured in the sprawling Shi'ite quarter of the Iraqi capital without incident, added the deputy director for operations.
Officials with Sadr, an outspoken critic of the US occupation, could not be contacted for comment Wednesday night.
Tensions soared between the Americans and Iraq's Shi'ite majority after two soldiers were killed in the October 9 ambush which followed a car bombing at a police station that claimed nine lives in the Baghdad slum of Sadr City.
Thousands of cleric Moqtada Sadr's followers marched to denounce America on October 10 as they buried two men killed in a shootout with US soldiers, also the previous day.