Thousands of Shia fighters have rushed to the central Iraqi city of Samarra to defend two shrines that were blown up by insurgents eight years ago, sparking the sectarian war that almost destroyed the country.
Convoys of fighters were seen being escorted north by Iraqi police trucks from Baghdad early on Friday and many have now reached the city where insurgents were in control after a lightning strike south.
The volunteer Shia fighters were quickly assembled after Iraqi forcesabandoned their positions in most of the area, leaving only a small number of troops to guard the Imam al-Askarien shrines.
Samarra is the fourth northern city to have all but fallen out of government control. The embattled prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, appears to have drawn battle lines further south in Taiji, hoping to defend Baghdad against insurgents who have occupied the north virtually unopposed.
Barack Obama on Thursday set the stage for renewed US military action in Iraq when he said his national security chiefs were looking at any and every way they could help the Iraqi authorities take the fight to the thousands of Sunni jihadists who have vowed to march on the capital.
White House officials said the president did not envision any circumstances in which ground troops could return to the country. Air strikes, however, are under active consideration.
Heavy clashes broke out by late Friday on the outskirts of Samarra between the Shia volunteers and Sunni insurgents who had been trying to win over residents, some of whom appear to view the new arrivals as liberators.
Witnesses said the shrines remained undamaged so far and that the insurgents had not been menacing residents. "Some of them have long hair and they are carrying black flags," said one man. "They are Arabs from other countries."
The Samarra shrines were twice reduced to rubble in February and April 2006 in attacks that sparked a brutal two-year sectarian war across Iraq. Since then, Shia Islamic sites have remained key targets as insurgent groups, led by the Islamic State of Iraq in the Levant (Isis) try to draw the Shia-led government back into the fight.
Source: theguardian
