US struggles to impose order in Baghdad

3.30pm

As US troops struggled to impose order on Baghdad today and other chaotic Iraqi cities, Washington escalated a war of words with Syria over its alleged support for Saddam Hussein's crumbling regime and other "terrorists."

"Now that the regime has gone in Baghdad, we hope that Syria will understand there is an opportunity for a better way for them, if they would stop supporting terrorist activities, and we hope the Syrians will respond accordingly," US Secretary of State Colin Powell told BBC radio.

US forces made some headway in their struggle to restore order on Saturday but suffered a high-profile setback as looters made off with a priceless collection of irreplaceable antiquities from the National Museum, making off with treasures dating back to the dawn of civilisation in Mesopotamia.

"They have looted or destroyed 170,000 items of antiquity dating back thousands of years. ... They were worth billions of dollars," said deputy director Nabhal Amin, weeping.

The looters broke into rooms built like bank vaults with huge steel doors. The museum grounds were full of smashed doors and windows and littered with glass wreckage of display cases.

Also on Saturday, Saddam Hussein's scientific adviser became his first close associate to surrender to US forces.

A day after the United States listed 55 Iraqi leaders it wanted killed or captured, Gen Amer Hammoudi al-Saadi turned himself in to US soldiers in the capital and was driven away in the front seat of a military jeep. He told Germany's ZDF television Iraq had no chemical or biological weapons.

A US intelligence official in Washington said: "Hopefully he will be more forthcoming now that he has surrendered."

"He is crucial to our understanding of what has been going on with their WMD (weapons of mass destruction) programme for years," the official told Reuters.

"He knows where stuff is hidden and he also knows the names of the major scientists associated with the programme."

In the BBC radio interview, Powell warned Damascus against becoming "a haven for all these people who should be brought to justice who are trying to get out of Baghdad."

Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq al-Shara said on Saturday US accusations that Damascus had helped Saddam's government were baseless. Senior Bush administration officials have accused Syria of providing military assistance to Baghdad.

Syria has warned that Washington could push the conflict beyond Iraq's borders, sowing chaos in the region.

"I am telling you now, because (the Bush administration) failed they are trying to pinpoint at a third country, perhaps Syria or another country," Shara told reporters.

On the west bank of the Tigris river in central Baghdad, US troops said they killed 15 to 20 fighters they described as Arab "mujahideen" on Saturday and seized one of the last strongholds of Arab fighters in the capital.

To the north, planes bombed Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, the only major urban centre still holding out.

US President George W Bush, in his weekly radio address, warned of "hard fighting" to come but made no mention of chaos that has raged as mobs, freed from decades of iron control, ransacked offices, shops and the homes of the wealthy.

US troops set up round-the-clock patrols in some quarters to check the lawlessness, and some 20 tonnes of medical supplies arrived in Baghdad on US C-130 transport planes to help replenish supplies at looted and overburdened hospitals.

Students marched to demand law and order in Baghdad but, in the slum area of Saddam City, US forces stepped back to let locals hunt pro-Saddam fighters on their own.

Looking ahead, US officials laid plans for a series of meetings of Iraqi opposition leaders from inside and outside the country to pave the way for an interim government. The first is set for Tuesday in the southern city of Nassiriya.

US commanders focused on wrapping up the 25-day-old war, sending planes to pound Tikrit, 180km north of Baghdad, and sending in army reinforcements from Kuwait -- but also said they would cut their naval presence in the Gulf.

The military says its first job is to fight and policing must take a back seat, but it is now moving to restore order and quell anarchy that has even seen hospitals stripped bare.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said US soldiers were now guarding a main Baghdad water plant and a major hospital. "Medical City Hospital seems for the most part secured," ICRC spokeswoman Antonella Notari said from Geneva.

In the north, Kurdish fighters tried to impose some order in the oil hub of Kirkuk, which they took on Thursday amid scenes of jubilation. They checked cars entering and leaving the city in search of suspected looters and their bounty.

But Arabs and Turkmens said the Kurds were guilty of abuses -- a dangerous development in an area of ethnic tension.

"I'm liberated now? ... The Kurds came and stole anything they could get their hands on, killed, pulled people out of their cars," said Riyadh Mustafa, an Arab.

Some foreign media reported violent Arab-Kurd clashes in Iraq's third city, Mosul, which fell to the Kurds on Friday after an entire Iraqi army corps surrendered. US troops moved into the city on Saturday in large numbers for the first time.

Meeting in Washington, the Group of Seven industrial nations -- which unites America with staunchly anti-war France and Germany as well as Japan, Italy, Canada and Britain -- called for multinational involvement in rebuilding Iraq.

It backed a fresh UN resolution on the effort, but US Treasury Secretary John Snow said this did not mark a compromise by the United States over the contentious issue.

Saddam's whereabouts remained a mystery as the US military announced a reward programme covering information about Saddam himself, his associates and weapons of all kinds.

Some theories suggest Saddam might be hiding in Tikrit, where loyal fighters are suspected of preparing a last stand.

Others suggest he died in a bombing raid in the upscale Mansur district of Baghdad on Monday - although local residents said they saw his younger son Qusay alive in a Baghdad suburb after the attack.

- REUTERS


Herald Feature: Iraq war