ARABIAN TIMES: IRAN-IRAQ ROUND-UP

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Iran on Saturday declined to confirm reports that Iraqi Shiite radical leader Moqtada al-Sadr had taken refuge in the Islamic republic. “No, I do not confirm these reports. These things are said to divert attention from the occupying forces who are the source of insecurity in Iraq,” government spokesman Gholam Hossein Elham told reporters.

The US military in Iraq has frequently said that Sadr pays regular visits to Iran, although Iranian officials have always denied his presence on their soil. News reports have also placed the radical cleric in Iran. On Friday, Sadr called a mass rally in Baghdad for April 9 to demand the withdrawal of US troops on the fifth anniversary of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

The announcement came as Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered his troops to halt raids on the cleric’s Shiite militiamen, following an almost week-long offensive on the Mahdi Army. Iran had urged both sides to negotiate an end to the clashes that have killed hundreds of people across Iraq.

Meanwhile, a suspected al-Qaeda hideout has been uncovered on an island on the Tigris river in central Iraq by a group of Sunni Arabs fighting the Islamist militants, their leader said on Saturday.

The hideout, from where al-Qaeda’s operations in the provinces of Salaheddin, Anbar and Diyala are believed to have been coordinated, was found on an island in the Tigris near the city of Samarra, 125 kilometres (80 miles) north of Baghdad.
Majin Younis Hassan, leader of the local anti-Qaeda group, said the hideout was discovered early on Saturday following an “intelligence tip”.

“We found 1,500 heavy, medium and light weapons as well as several bombs,” Hassan told AFP.

He said the underground hideout had four big rooms, each with eight beds.
“We found documents which were messages between the base and other al-Qaeda branches. One document had the names of al-Qaeda members, another was a message from the group’s chief (Abu Ayyub al-Masri) to other members,” Hassan said.

In Baghdad, US forces are pushing Shiite militias farther from the Green Zone in an attempt to put the area out of range for rockets and mortars that have recently pounded the diplomatic and government enclave.

NOTHING HERE MAKES ME FEEL WE'RE LOSING.