2.5 million residents of Sadr City caught in the middle of Iraq showdown

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http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gci4WAFetLAMlBadNwg9w72TVkpgD9074PR80

By KIM GAMEL – 6 hours ago

BAGHDAD (AP) — Parents are afraid to send their children to school. Once-thriving markets are nearly empty as residents fear being caught up in gunbattles and airstrikes or face intimidation by gunmen who rule the streets.

Sadr City is the Baghdad stronghold of Iraq's biggest Shiite militia, the Mahdi Army of hard-line cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

But it's also home to 2.5 million people — nearly half of Baghdad's 6 million population. Tens of thousands more live in neighborhoods around Sadr City's grid-pattern streets, carved out in the 1950s for workers coming from the provinces.

The current showdown between the militiamen and the Shiite-led government has turned Sadr City into a raw narrative for both sides: Each needs control of the district as the linchpin for the capital. This means that — for the moment — a huge segment of Baghdad is effectively held captive to the violence.