US troops detain Muslim cleric in Baghdad

[leftchick]

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?sf=2813&click_id=2813&art_id=qw1105634520427B262&set_id=6

Baghdad - United States forces detained a Sunni Muslim cleric in an overnight raid on his Baghdad home, an official from the influential Muslim Clerics' Association said on Thursday.

"American forces raided his home at 1.30am and searched it. When they found nothing they took Sheikh Ahmed al-Jibouri and left," Sheikh Omar Ragheb Zaydan told Reuters. "No reason was given."

Jibouri is a professor at the Islamic University and imam of the Khashab Mosque in northwestern Baghdad, he said. The US military had no immediate information on such an arrest.

US and Iraqi forces have detained dozens of Iraqi clerics in recent months, including many Sunnis they suspect of being linked to insurgents bent on expelling foreign forces from Iraq.

Zaydan said more than 50 members of the Muslim Clerics' Association, which controls hundreds of mosques around the country, remained in US detention.

"We consider these arrests as pressure on the association to change its position over the election and its position over the presence of occupation forces," he said.

... Democracy American style!

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Is this practice for 2006

when they detain Democratic Committee people and hold them to 'change their position over the election' -meaning only Repukes can hold office.

[NYC]

2. Is this legal?

"We consider these arrests as pressure on the association to change its position over the election and its position over the presence of occupation forces," he said.

[leftchick]

3. I would not think so!

But then again the whole process has been a farse!