Shia Cleric Orders Followers to End Iraq Clashes

The leader of Iraq's Mahdi Army Shia militia ordered his followers to cease fire yesterday, raising hopes of a halt to the fierce internecine clashes with government forces that spread across the country from Basra last week and threatened the security gains from the US military "surge".

The cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said in a statement issued in Najaf: "Because of the religious responsibility and to stop Iraqi blood being shed ... we call for an end to armed appearances in Basra and all other provinces. Anyone carrying a weapon and targeting government institutions will not be one of us."

Despite Sadr's apparent move back from the brink, British officials said the defence secretary, Des Browne, was expected to put further cuts in British troop numbers in southern Iraq on hold when he makes a Commons statement on the Basra situation tomorrow.

Although Sadr linked his ceasefire call to renewed demands for an end to "illegal arrests" of his supporters and implementation of an earlier prisoner amnesty, a relieved Iraqi government was quick to applaud the shift. "This is a positive statement. We welcome it. We believe this will support the government of Iraq's efforts to impose security," said Ali al-Dabbagh, a spokesman for Nouri al-Maliki, the prime minister who had personally commanded the surprise crackdown on the Mahdi Army in Basra seven days ago.

Sadr's apparent climbdown, after fighting in which at least 300 people were reportedly killed, could be tactical and not wholly voluntary. It came after the American military stepped up its direct involvement at the weekend, using special forces on the ground to set targets for US fighter bombers in Basra and allegedly also in the Sadr City district of Baghdad.

Iraq's government and its allies, however, have strong reasons to hope the ceasefire sticks. The US, Iraq's Shia- and Kurd-led government and British forces stationed outside Basra had all described the army offensive against Sadr's militia, as a wholly Iraqi government-run initiative. Maliki described it as "a decisive and final battle" and President George Bush "a defining moment" for Iraq.

But stiffer than expected resistance, plus the resulting violent backlash in several other provinces as well as Baghdad, raised suspicions that the Iraqi military could not finish what it had started - and that inter-Shia fighting could ignite a nationwide conflagration.

Concerns were also raised that Iraqi forces appeared to be targeting only the Sadrists, leaving unscathed militias linked to rival Shia groups such as the Badr Organization of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, that supports Maliki's Dawa party. The rival groups are engrossed in a bitter battle for control of southern Iraq's oil, territory and political direction, further complicated by Iranian influence-peddling.

Increased US involvement in the fighting reflected this nervousness and was mirrored to a limited degree by British forces, which moved closer to Basra yesterday, deploying armored vehicles at a checkpoint south of the city. "We've had ground forces outside the wire assisting Iraqi forces," a British military spokesman, Major Tom Holloway, told the Reuters news agency. "As yet there is no intent to push British amour into the city."

In his Commons statement tomorrow, Browne is expected to announce a freeze on further cuts in the number of British troops in Iraq. Gordon Brown expressed the hope before Christmas that the number of British troops based at Basra airport - now 4,100 - would be cut to 2,500 in the "late spring". Defence officials suggested yesterday that there was little chance of that happening.

British defence officials and military commanders are extremely sensitive to charges - expressed forcefully last week by Hoshyar Zebari, Iraq's foreign minister - that UK forces were "doing nothing" and had allowed Basra to be overrun by militants. However, officials make it clear they do not want British troops, on what is called an "overwatch" role, to be drawn into combat operations on the ground.