Iraqi

BAGHDAD - Followers of the anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr took to the streets yesterday in a demonstration against the proposed security agreement between the U.S. and Iraqi governments, now being reviewed by Iraqi political leaders. In a message to the assembled marchers, one of al-Sadr's senior clerics read a statement from him warning that "whoever tells you that this pact gives us sovereignty is lying," according to news services. A leading Sadrist cleric at the rally, Hazim al-Arraji, said: "This is the voice of the Iraqi people from all over Iraq: We need the invaders to leave our country; no one wants them to stay.

WASHINGTON - They wake before dawn, with time to exercise, eat and pray before the day's first class in firing Kalashnikov rifles. Over the next eight hours, they practice using bazookas or laying roadside bombs, with a break for lunch and mandatory religious instruction. There is free time in the evening to watch television or play pingpong. Lights out at 11 p.m. Such is a typical day at a dusty military base outside Tehran, Iran, where for the past several years members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Quds Force and Lebanese Hezbollah operatives have trained Iraqi Shiites to launch attacks against American forces in Iraq, according to accounts given to American interrogators by captured Iraqi fighters.

BAGHDAD - A Moroccan fighter identified by the U.S. military as the No. 2 commander in al-Qaida in Iraq detonated a suicide vest rather than surrender when American soldiers attacked his hide-out last week in the northern city of Mosul, a military spokesman said yesterday. The fighter, known as Abu Qaswarah or Abu Sara, led al-Qaida in Iraq's northern operations and was the point man for smuggling foreign fighters into that region, according to the military. U.S. forces were raiding a building where Abu Qaswarah was holed up Oct. 5 when a gunfight erupted, the military spokesman said.

BAGHDAD - Army Gen. Ray Odierno took command of American troops here yesterday with words that made clear he wants the Iraqis to take a bigger role in security and move forward with political progress as pressure mounts on U.S. forces to leave the country. In comments shortly after receiving command from his predecessor and former boss, Gen. David H. Petraeus, Odierno emphasized the need for Iraq's government to hold provincial elections this year and use its military and police to sustain security gains made since Petraeus' arrival in February 2007.

BAGHDAD - The United States has agreed to remove combat troops from Iraqi cities by next June and from the rest of the country by the end of 2011 if conditions in Iraq remain relatively stable, according to Iraqi and American officials involved in negotiating a security accord governing American forces there. The withdrawal timetable, which Bush administration officials called "aspirational goals" rather than fixed dates, are contained in the draft of an agreement that must still be approved by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other Iraqi leaders before it goes before Iraq's fractious parliament.

WASHINGTON - Violence has largely subsided in Iraq. American casualties are at their lowest levels since 2003, and Iraqi forces are maintaining security in most of the country. Is the war in Iraq over? Iraq is a hot issue out on the presidential campaign trail, where Barack Obama and John McCain are squabbling over the genesis of the war and where to go from here. But from the battlefield, U.S. combat commanders are giving some surprising answers. "Our ticket out of here was to develop Iraqi security forces.

BAGHDAD - Predawn raids by elite Iraqi forces yesterday resulted in the fatal shooting of a government employee and the arrest of two prominent Sunni Arabs, according to witnesses and officials. The troops were from the central government's counter-terrorism units, said Gov. Raad Rashid al-Tamimi of Diyala province, where the raid took place. They had stormed the governorate building in the city of Baqouba and arrested Sunni provincial council member Hussein al-Zubaidi, who belongs to the Iraqi Islamic Party.

BAGHDAD - The United States and Iraq are nearing completion of negotiations on a security agreement that would pull American troops out of Iraqi cities by next July and foresees all U.S. combat troops gone from Iraq by 2011, according to two Iraqi officials who are familiar with the negotiations. "The tactical team is finished, and it's a closed deal, but remember that we've been through this before, and every time we close a deal it's reopened," said a senior official who has been participating in the talks.

Today is moving day for Saad Ahmed, a wounded Iraqi interpreter who lost both legs to a roadside bomb last year while working for the U.S. military. Ahmed is moving to a high-end apartment in North Bethesda that is wheelchair-accessible, with a spacious bathroom and an elevator to the lobby. "I saw it. It was nice, beautiful, like a hotel," he said after being shown the apartment by Lutheran Social Services of the National Capital Area, the nonprofit agency that is coordinating his resettlement.

Three years ago in Iraq, Saad Ahmed was hailed by Americans as a hero after he extinguished a fire in a Humvee with five U.S. Army soldiers inside. Unfortunately, the danger for Ahmed did not end then. A year ago, the 33-year-old Iraqi nearly died working as a translator for the U.S. military. A roadside bomb mangled both his legs at the knee, scorched his left hand, damaged nerves in his eyes and boggled his memory. For weeks afterward, he floated in a coma-like state. $5,000 payment and no further coverage, he said.