Wide fighting in Iraq

BAGHDAD -- Fierce fighting raged across Iraq yesterday, as US Marines clashed with insurgents in the Sunni Muslim-dominated city of Fallujah, and American and coalition forces fought Shi'ite Muslim militants in Baghdad and in southern cities, including Kut and Nasiriyah.

US and Iraqi officials said about 12 Marines were killed in the town of Ramadi, where dozens of Sunnis attacked US forces near the governor's residence. Five Marines were killed in Fallujah and in fighting elsewhere in the country in the last two days. Clashes yesterday also claimed the lives of two other coalition soldiers. About 70 Iraqis were killed, including women and children.

It was unclear whether coalition troops had control of the holy city of Najaf, where renegade Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr was holed up with his supporters in the Army of the Mahdi, who have been driving the revolts throughout southern Iraq. It has been the largest Shi'ite rebellion since US forces ousted Saddam Hussein nearly one year ago. US Marines entered Fallujah yesterday on the second day of Operation Vigiliant Resolve. More than 2,000 troops have encircled the city and begun missions to arrest or kill insurgents responsible for the resistance fighting that was punctuated last week by the killing and mutilation of four American contractors in downtown Fallujah and the killing of five US soldiers on the city's outskirts.

In the capital, three US soldiers in the First Armored Division were killed in ambushes in the Kadhimiya district.

In the last three days, about 30 Americans and 136 Iraqis have been killed in fighting.

The White House declared last night that US resolve in Iraq was "unshakable" in the face of yesterday's attacks. White House spokesman Scott McClellan said President Bush had received an update on fierce fighting. "Our resolve is firm, our resolve is unshakable, and we will prevail. The president was told that our troops are performing well. The president is proud of our troops," he said.

Through a spokesman, Sadr claimed to be in control of Najaf's police and government buildings and defied the US-led occupation authority's promise to arrest him on a murder warrant.

He also refused to call off his armed supporters. "This insurrection shows that the Iraqi people are not satisfied with the occupation, and they will not accept oppression," Sadr said in a statement released in Najaf.

But the top US official in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, said Sadr's illegal militia would not derail the political handover of power to Iraqis, due by June 30.

"[Sadr] has basically tried to take control of the country," Bremer told CNN. "It represents a fundamental challenge to the rule of law, and it will not stand."

Iraq's foreign minister, in London, called for more coalition troops. There are 135,000 US troops in the region, 20,000 more than normal, because new arrivals are overlapping with troops at the end of yearlong tours.

Iraqi politicians across the political spectrum condemned the violence. Ayad Allawi, a member of the Iraqi Governing Council and head of its national security committee, said the vast majority of Iraqis were disgusted by the wave of violence, which he said "is not a major uprising."

"People who claim they have power and control the streets -- we will have elections in six months, and then they can prove how much control they have," Allawi said. "We cannot revert to violence and bloodletting."

A Sunni Governing Council member from Mosul, Sheikh Ghazi Ajil al-Yawar, said that fighters like those in Fallujah and the Mahdi army threatened to drag down an Iraqi majority eager for democracy.

"I am optimistic because the Iraqi simple people are tired of war, violence, chaos," Yawar said. "Simple people will suffer the most if people keep escalating the violence."

Helicopters hovered over Baghdad late into the night, and explosions rang out over the city.

US Marines in Fallujah seized parts of the town, which had effectively been unpoliced by American troops for months, but heavy fighting was expected to continue there for days.

Across a wide swath of southern Iraq, coalition troops from Britain, Spain, Italy, and the Ukraine battled pockets of resistance -- mostly attributed to Sadr's Mahdi army -- in areas that had been relatively calm recently.

In Nasiriyah, where some of the fiercest battles took place last April, Shi'ite militias yesterday temporarily took control of the city's main bridges. Italian troops killed 15 Iraqis and pushed the insurgents back. Twelve Italian soldiers were wounded, coalition spokeswoman Paola Della Casa told the Italian news agency Apcom.

Della Casa said the militia fighters used civilians as human shields, and a woman and two children were among the dead.

Ukrainian soldiers regained control of Kut after one soldier was killed and five were wounded, the Ukrainian defense ministry said. But a Sadr spokesman told Agence France-Presse that the Ukrainians only held a bridge in front of their base.

In the southern city of Amarah, British troops killed 15 Iraqis and wounded eight.

And in the holy city of Karbala, where millions of Shi'ite pilgrims are expected to flock this weekend for the annual religious holiday of Arba'in, Bulgarian, Spanish, and Polish troops fought militias armed with grenades and machine guns. Two Polish and three Bulgarian soldiers were wounded.

Yesterday, Sadr defiantly moved from his barricaded mosque in Kufa to his office in Najaf, but there was no independent confirmation of his location. Through a spokesman, he claimed the support of a raft of clerics, including Iraq's most senior, the Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani.

His supporters said they control Najaf's police stations and said it would be difficult -- if not impossible -- for US or other coalition military forces to enter the holy shrine area to arrest Sadr on warrants announced yesterday for murder and theft.

"America has shown its evil intentions, and the proud Iraqi people cannot accept it. They must defend their rights by any means they see fit," Sadr said in a statement. "I'm prepared to have my own blood shed for what is holy to me." He called on Sunnis and Shi'ites alike to fight occupation troops.