Iraqi police patrol, weapons handover

(13 Oct 2004) SHOTLIST 1. Policeman directing traffic 2. Two Iraqi National Guard soldiers directing traffic on street 3. An Iraqi female soldier in a military vehicle 4. Various of weapons and shells on ground 5. Weapons being turned in, money on the table 5. Soldier 6. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ali Sultan Iraqi National Guard: "This is a peaceful initiative and we support it because the Sadr movement is our movement. We are happy for this situation. Hopefully the Iraqi government and al-Sadr movement will become one state and one force. God willing, we shall be victorious over the terrorists and whoever wants to destroy the country." 7. Iraqis 8. Two Iraqi men sitting, holding guns STORYLINE Hundreds of militiamen loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Wednesday continued to turn in their weapons to allow Iraqi forces to take control of Sadr City, the slum district of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. For the third consecutive day, militiamen lined up outside police stations allocated for this purpose. Some of the weapons appeared to be old and it seemed unlikely that the militants of the al-Mahdi Army would surrender all its arms. Anonymous sources close to the militia in Sadr City - home to up to two and a half (m) million people - said some of the gunmen were handing over weapons that were not properly functioning or were considered surplus. They said cash could be used to buy new weapons and the handover process did not require those surrendering weapons to prove membership of the al-Mahdi Army, something that has meant that ordinary Iraqis were able to trade guns for cash. The prices on offer for the weapons in Sadr City are tempting in a country with unemployment thought to be 50 percent. They range from one US dollar for a single bullet, 150 dollars for an assault rifle, 500 dollars for a rocket propelled grenade launcher and one thousand dollars for a heavy machine-gun. US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Tuesday that he hoped all Shiite fighters in Sadr City would join a cash-for-weapons disarmament programme but conceded that was not yet the case. Militiamen began handing in weapons on Monday, the start of a five-day period during which they agreed to disarm in the flashpoint district. US officials hope the weapons handover will be the first step toward ending the Shiite rebellion, enabling the Americans and their Iraqi allies to focus on the more dangerous Sunni insurgency. Once the weapons handover is completed this week, the government has pledged to start releasing al-Sadr followers who have not committed crimes and to rebuild the war-ravaged slum. Raids have also been suspended. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...