U.S., Iraqis fight Shiite militants

BAGHDAD, Iraq — U.S. and Iraqi troops fought a fierce battle Sunday with militants in the southern city of Diwaniya, a stronghold of militia members loyal to the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, the U.S. military said.

An Abrams tank was severely damaged by rocket-propelled grenades fired by up to 10 teams of Mahdi Army militiamen, the U.S. military said. No Iraqi or U.S. troop casualties were reported, but 30 militiamen were killed, the military said. An official of the al-Sadr militia disputed that figure.

The skirmish, which shook the Shiite city overnight with heavy machine-gun fire and explosions, marked the third serious clash between U.S. or Iraqi soldiers and members of the Mahdi Army in Diwaniya in less than two months.

Abdul Razzaq al-Nedawi, the head of al-Sadr's office in Diwaniya, said residents were surprised on Sunday when U.S. troops began raiding homes in three residential neighborhoods in the middle of the night.

"There was an agreement with the Iraqi government that U.S. forces would not enter residential areas in this city," he said. "This agreement was made through a channel linked to the office of the prime minister."

Al-Nedawi denied that any Mahdi Army fighters were killed.

The fighting was touched off in the early morning hours when the home of Kefeh al-Greiti, a Mahdi commander, was raided, The Associated Press reported.

"The Americans had a list of wanted people from the Sadr movement," said al-Nedawi, adding that al-Greiti eluded capture.

The U.S. military said in a statement, however, that Iraqi army soldiers had arrested three people as well as a "high value target" believed to have been involved in the killings of Iraqi army soldiers on Aug. 28.

In Baghdad, U.S. troops, along with their Iraqi counterparts, have been conducting sweeps of troubled areas to secure them. They have raided the homes of many Shiite militiamen and arrested those believed to be behind targeted assassinations in the capital.

The military on Sunday announced the deaths of five more U.S. service members. Three Marines died Friday from "enemy action" in Anbar Province, in western Iraq. Two soldiers were killed Saturday, one in Mosul by a roadside bomb and the other in Baghdad by small-arms fire.

On Sunday, the police found 35 bodies across Baghdad, many of them bearing signs of torture and shot at close range, an Interior Ministry official said.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Iraqi policemen fell sick from poisoning Sunday at a base in southern Iraq after the evening meal breaking their daily Ramadan fast, and officials were investigating whether the poisoning was intentional.