Talabani’s office claimed that the report was “fabricated and full of lies,” adding that Talabani has “instructed his lawyer in the United States” to file a similar lawsuit against Rubin in a US court. The media spokesman of Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan said that Talabani will pursue the lawsuit in “his capacity as the Secretary of the PUK, and not as the President of Iraq.” Meanwhile, sources close to Kurdistan’s President, Mas'ud al-Barzani, denied reports claiming that al-Barzani, who was also mentioned in the report, was planning on pursuing legal action as well.
Meanwhile, the aftermath of the violent clashes between the Iraqi Police and Shi%u2019a religious groups in the South remained the focus of Iraqi papers. Kull al-‘Iraq quoted the Iraqi Minister for National Security, Shirwan al-Wa’ili, who said that, contrary to early reports, the group involved in the fighting was not “the Army of Heaven,” which clashed with the Iraqi Army last year, but a different sect, which calls itself “Ansar al-Mahdi,” (the league of Mahdi) and follows a religious leader called Ahmad Bin Hasan all-Yamani, who claims to be the representative of the 12th Shi’a Imam.
Iraqi papers also reported that following Friday’s clashes, where 75 people were killed, confrontations renewed on Sunday in Basra and Nasiriya. Az-Zaman said that today’s fighting ended without any losses in the ranks of the security services, and that 20 suspects were arrested. The paper interviewed Sheikh Qasim al-Ta’I, a high-ranking Shi’a cleric, who said that Friday’s confrontations were due to the inaction of the Ministry of Interior, which, he claimed, has little control over southern provinces. Al-Ta’i also said that he attempted to warn against the sprouting religious cults after the “Army of Heaven” incident last year, and that he “warned” Sadrists in the South against associating with such “extremist groups.”
On the other hand, pan-Arab al-Hayat said that the Ansar al-Mahdi cult was planning to control the oil installations of Basra during Friday’s events. The paper quoted an “Iraqi military commander” who said that the group successfully occupied an installation of the “Southern Oil Company,” before the Police restored control of the buildings. The paper also said that two 14-year-old minors were among the fighters of the group, and that they were using sniper rifles to shoot at police officers and civilians during the confrontations.
It should be noted that last year’s incident with “the Army of Heaven” bred several “conspiracy theories” that contested the government’s version of the events. Several Iraqi politicians claimed that the alleged eschatological cult was, in fact, an organization of Shi’as outraged by the growing Iranian influence in southern Iraq and the government’s complicity with Iran, and that last year’s fighting was a government plot to quell dissident Shi’as.
Similar “alternative versions” are already starting to appear, led by Az-Zaman. The paper – in its international edition – described the rogue elements in Basra as “elements that oppose Maliki’s rule and the Iranian influence in Iraq.” The paper also alluded that the group dubbed as al-Yamani’s may, in fact, be composed of ex-officers in the old Iraqi Army. Furthermore, Az-Zaman referred to last year’s “Army of Heaven” clashes as “a massacre committed by Nuri al-Maliki’s forces against over 700 men, women and children, who chanted against Iranian interference and the complicity of political and religious authorities ... and were killed by airplanes and heavy weapons.”
It should be noted that Az-Zaman did not carry any of these opinions onto its local Iraq edition, where it stuck to the official version of events. Meanwhile, the paper mentioned a video that was captured by the al-Hurra Satellite Channel, showing Iraqi Policemen kicking and beating a soldier – likely from the Yamani group – who had fallen – injured – to the ground, none of the other Iraqi outlets mentioned the incident, which, according to Az-Zaman, has caused outrage and “increased the escalation” in Basra.
