Cleric Keeps Grip on Najaf Shrine, Even While Saying He'll Yield It
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Moktada al-Sadr's aide said he was waiting for an inventory of the shrine to be carried out before he could hand over the keys.
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A Pakistani cleric holed up in a mosque in Islamabad said on Thursday he and his student followers were willing to surrender, raising hopes of an end to a confrontation in which 19 people have died.
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Aug. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Moqtada al-Sadr, the Shiite Muslim cleric leading an insurgency in Najaf, is preparing to hand over control of the city&#39;s holy shrine to Iraqi religious authorities after a night of bombing by US forces, Reuters reported.
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Anti-US cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and his followers are ready to leave the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf if American-led forces pull back from the holy Shi&#39;ite site, an aide to Sadr says.
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Rebel Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr will remain a free man after he agreed a peace deal to end an uprising in the holy city of Najaf, Minister of State Kasim Daoud told a news conference early Friday.
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BAGHDAD, Iraq - Authorities insisted on Thursday that they won't give in to militants' demands to free female Iraqi prisoners despite the plea of a tearful British hostage begging Britain to save his life in a video released by his captors.    Meanwhile, Iraq's most powerful Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, said that increasing violence must not be used as a pretext for delaying elections scheduled for late January...
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NAJAF, Iraq  - US marines and a radical Iraqi cleric are locked in a tense standoff after the firebrand leader refused to leave a holy shrine in Najaf despite earlier agreeing to disarm his militia and withdraw.
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Supporters of rebel cleric Muqtada al-Sadr remained in control of the Imam Ali Mosque on Saturday as negotiations continued over terms for handing the shrine
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Aug. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Moqtada al-Sadr, a Shiite Muslim cleric leading an insurgency in Iraq, ordered his militiamen to leave holy shrines in Najaf, as fighting in the city continued, the Qatar-based al-Jazeera television network said.
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NAJAF, Iraq  - At least five loud explosions on  Thursday echoed from near holy sites in the Iraqi city of Najaf  where a radical Shi'ite cleric has remained holed up despite  earlier agreeing to leave a sacred shrine.
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Fighting continued in Najaf late last night despite an earlier declaration that the Shia leader Muqtada Sadr had accepted a peace plan designed to end the two-week battle for control of the city.
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Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani urged his supporters converging on Najaf on Thursday not to enter the battered holy city until he arrived, a senior aide said.
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A radical cleric says his followers will not surrender as tensions mount at Pakistan's besieged Red Mosque.
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NAJAF, Iraq  - Shi'ite fighters appeared to be in  control of a holy shrine in Najaf Friday, hours after Iraq's  interim government said it had overcome a bloody uprising by  seizing the Imam Ali mosque without a shot being fired.
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Radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his fighters Thursday to hand control of a revered Najaf shrine to top Shiite religious authorities, hours after U.S. forces bombed militant positions and Iraq's prime minister made a "final call" for the cleric's militia to surrender.
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NAJAF, Iraq  Followers loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said Friday they were preparing to hand control of the revered Imam Ali Shrine to top Shiite religious authorities in a ...
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Najaf, Iraq - Militants loyal to firebrand Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr remained in control of a revered shrine at the centre of the crisis in Najaf on Saturday as they bickered with top Shia leaders over how to hand the holy site over.