Iraqi troops say control Basra stronghold

By Aref Mohammed

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi soldiers swooped on the Basra stronghold of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on Saturday, saying they had seized control of his militia bastion where they suffered an embarrassing setback in late March.

The dawn raid by government troops on the Hayaniya district of the southern oil city was backed by a thunderous bombardment by U.S. warplanes and British artillery.

It came after more intense fighting in Baghdad between security forces and Sadr's black-masked militiamen. Police said 12 people had been killed in the Shi'ite slum of Sadr City and hospitals said they received more than 130 wounded overnight.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's crackdown against Sadr's Mehdi Army militia in Basra last month was criticised by U.S. commanders as poorly planned and hasty.

It failed to drive the militia from the streets and sparked battles across the south and in the cleric's Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City. The government dismissed 1,300 soldiers and police for refusing to fight.

On Saturday by contrast, Harith al-Idhari, head of the Sadr office in Basra, said the militia had not put up any resistance, in observance of a ceasefire declared by the cleric.

Major-General Abdul-Karim Khalaf, an interior ministry spokesman, described the operation as a major success.

"Our troops deployed in all the parts of the (Hayaniya) district and controlled it without much resistance," Khalaf told Reuters. "Now we are working on house-to-house checking. We have made many arrests."