Agencies hold off on new aid for Sadr City

Aid agencies and humanitarian organisations such as the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) are adopting a wait-and-see attitude towards the latest round of fighting in the Baghdad suburb of Sadr City. More than 30 people were killed and more than 200 injured in a 24-hour period after fighting resumed on Monday night, according to Ministry of Health figures. Mehdi Army fighters, loyal to anti-US cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, fought US troops in Sadr City and in the southern holy city of Najaf for three weeks, after US troops surrounded Sadr's home. A truce between fighters and the interim Iraqi government in Sadr City ended on Monday. The ICRC continues to deliver 540,000 litres of water per day to areas on the outskirts of the poor suburb, where there are no existing domestic water supplies, spokesman Ahmed Khalid al-Rawi told IRIN in Baghdad. "We continue our daily distribution in Sadr City except in the areas where there are clashes, which we try and avoid because of the security situation," al-Rawi said. British-based aid agency Islamic Relief is doing an assessment of the Sadr City situation, Mohammed Makki Fathi, operations manager, told IRIN. Many of the fighters in Sadr City are believed to have returned home with their weapons from fighting in Najaf. Young men stared defiantly at US tanks over the weekend, although there were no clashes and streets were busy. At the same time, the ICRC has delivered one-and-a-half tons of medical supplies to the Ramadi directorate, which will be delivered to needy cities around the region, al-Rawi told IRIN. Ramadi is in the Anbar governorate, in the so-called "Sunni Triangle" which is seen as being hostile to Coalition forces. The region - north and west of Baghdad - includes Ramadi, Fallujah, where fighting in April left scores dead and more than 100 houses damaged, and Samarrah. US troops and Iraqi police do not patrol many areas in the region said to be filled with pro-Saddam loyalists. Medical personnel in Fallujah two weeks ago delivered supplies to Najaf left over from the fighting in April. "They will deliver supplies now to Anbar governorate, according to the needs of these medical centres," al-Rawi said. "We always have contacts with the different health directorates, so when they have urgent needs, we respond to those needs." Since families around Iraq continue to receive a monthly food basket under the public distribution system now administered by the Ministry of Trade, the ICRC will probably not increase its humanitarian response to Sadr City, al-Rawi said. "The main problem is the escalation of violence," al-Rawi said. "We always call for the civilians to be protected in clashes, because they have no part in the violence." A worker at another aid agency said he could not talk about projects, including possible aid to Sadr City, for security reasons. Following the recent kidnapping of two Italian women and two Iraqis from Un Pont Per, or A Bridge To (Baghdad), and Intersos, two NGOs working on health and education projects around the country, several aid agency workers told IRIN that they were re-evaluating their stance in Iraq.