Al-Maliki criticizes raid by U.S.

BAGHDAD – Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki condemned a U.S. raid Saturday in Baghdad’s Shiite Sadr City slum – a politically sensitive district for him – in which American troops searching for Iranian-linked militants sparked a firefight the U.S. said left 26 dead.

The U.S. military said all those killed in the fighting were gunmen, some of them firing from behind cars. But an Iraqi official put the death toll lower, at eight, and said they were civilians. Residents also said eight civilians were killed in their homes, angrily accusing American troops of firing wildly during the pre-dawn assault.

Sadr City is the Iraqi capital’s largest Shiite neighborhood – home to some 2.5 million people – making U.S. raids there potentially embarrassing for al-Maliki’s Shiite-led government. The district is also the stronghold of the Mahdi Army, a militia loyal to anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who was once al-Maliki’s ally.

“The Iraqi government totally rejects U.S. military operations … conducted without prior approval from the Iraqi military command,” al-Maliki said in a statement concerning the Sadr City raid. “Anyone who breaches the military command orders will face investigation.”

Al-Maliki last year banned military operations in Sadr City without his approval after complaints from his Shiite political allies. The ban frustrated U.S. commanders pushing for a crackdown on the Mahdi Army, blamed for sectarian killings.

Al-Maliki later agreed that no area of the capital was off-limits, after President Bush ordered reinforcements to Iraq as part of the Baghdad security operation.

In Muqdadiyah, 60 miles north of the capital, police said a suicide bomber blew himself up near a crowd of police recruits, killing at least 23 people and wounding 17.

The U.S. military also said a U.S. soldier was killed and three others were wounded Friday when a sophisticated, armor-piercing bomb hit their combat patrol in southern Baghdad.