Baghdad market seeing a return to normalcy

[unhappycamper]

Baghdad market seeing a return to normalcy
By James Warden, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Thursday, April 3, 2008

BAGHDAD — People flooded the market in the Shurta neighborhood of Baghdad on Tuesday.

Men guarded butchered goats from swarms of flies. Women lugged legumes back to their homes for cooking. And children scampered about through the crowded stalls of the North Arrows Market, as the Americans call it.

It all bore the unremarkable color of an Iraqi market — except that “unremarkable” seems almost miraculous when vicious fighting in this very market ended only a few days ago.

“We suffered from the violence, but now it’s getting better,” said Hazal Merza, a shopper who was relaxing at a local store.

The peace in this neighborhood comes after Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his fighters off the streets, effectively ending a battle between Sadr’s Mahdi Army and official Iraqi forces that began early last week. While traffic in the Shurta area still isn’t quite at its peak levels, both American and Iraqi commanders agree that life here is returning to normal.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=53788