Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
Photo: AFP-Getty Images

NAJAF, Iraq — Iraq’s top Shiite cleric returned to the country yesterday and said he had a plan to end the fighting in the “burning city” of Najaf, as the crisis around one of its holiest shrine neared a climax.

Aides to Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani said the cleric would unveil an initiative to get Shiite fighters out of the revered Imam Ali Mosque. They gave no details. Sistani also called on Iraqis to march to Najaf to save it.

Sistani arrived in the southern city of Basra from Kuwait, having undergone heart treatment in London. He plans to head to Najaf today. Iraqi ministers and members of the national assembly held talks yesterday with Sistani on the Najaf conflict, a source close to the ayatollah’s representative in Basra said.

At the request of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, Minister of State Kassem Daoud and Minister of State for the Provinces Wael Abdel Latif flew into Basra to meet with Sistani, the source said. They were accompanied by members of the newly elected Parliament, including Sheikh Hussein Al-Sadr, a distant relative of cleric and militia leader Moqtada Sadr, who led a national conference peace delegation to Najaf last week. “The talks were positive and valuable and soon you will be hearing something cheerful,” Sadr said. “Grand Ayatollah Sistani is to offer an initiative as soon as he’s in Najaf,” he added.

His return came as US and Iraqi forces tightened their grip around Mehdi Army of Sadr holed up in the mosque, advancing to within 300 meters (yards) of the shrine.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for Sadr said that the Mehdi Army had lost control of significant parts of Najaf, following heavy US-led attacks in the Iraqi city. “It’s not like before. The area we control has significantly shrunk. They (the Americans) are trying to maintain their control on Najaf because they have failed everywhere else in Iraq,” Sheikh Ahmed Al-Shaibani said.

On the 21st day of fighting, US planes fired missiles within meters (yards) of the shrine. A US military plane launched airstrikes last night on positions in Najaf held by the Mehdi Army, a witness said. The AC-130 gunship fired its cannon on positions near a shrine where the insurgents are holed up.

US armor held the shrine in a pincer grip from the west and east and heavy artillery pounded areas to the south as snipers fired on all those coming or going from the shrine. The closest US vehicle was 20 meters (yards) from the western gate of the complex, one of the most important Shiite sites in the world. All four gates of the compound were bolted by militiamen inside.

“We ask all believers to volunteer to go with us to Najaf,” Sistani said in a statement read out by his aide Hayder Al-Safi. “I have come for the sake of Najaf and I will stay in Najaf until the crisis ends.”

Sistani’s aides said he would leave for Najaf at 7 a.m. today with his supporters. They urged US forces encircling the gold-domed mosque to withdraw.

Sadr has also called for his own followers to march on Najaf, sparking fears that the influx of thousands of rival Shiites into the tense city could ignite renewed violence.

Police also arrested senior Sadr aide Ali Sumeisim in Najaf, and said they had captured a number of Sadr supporters who had stolen sacred items from the mosque. Sadr’s aides denied the accusation, saying it was part of a smear campaign. Al Jazeera television said insurgents had seized two relatives of Iraqi Defense Minister Hazim Al-Shalaan, and had demanded that US forces leave Najaf and that police release Sumeisim.

Elsewhere, US aircraft attacked targets in the city of Fallujah yesterday, killing three people and wounding four, a hospital official said. Three others were killed and 10 wounded in gunfire and mortar attacks in a residential district of Kufa late yesterday, medical sources said.