The Iraqi government will not allow Shia Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to wage an "open war" in Iraq and will move to curb his militia, Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said today.
Sadr, whose Mahdi Army militia has battled US and Iraqi government forces, threatened on Saturday to launch an "open war until liberation" against the US-backed government if it continued a month-old crackdown on his followers.
The threat was followed by what the US military called the heaviest fighting for weeks in his east Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City.
"Of course nobody will accept open warfare in Iraq or allow the rule of militias to be established," Mr Zebari told Reuters in Bahrain. "The Iraq government will be very firm to confront all outlaw militias as was proven in Basra and other places."
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday backed Iraq's crackdown on the militias in a visit to Baghdad where the worst fighting in weeks killed 23 people.