DISPATCH FROM DOWN UNDER

Iraqis rally for US exit
10apr05

TENS of thousands of Shi'ites gathered in Baghdad yesterday for an anti-US protest to mark two years since the Iraqi capital fell to coalition troops

The marchers chanted: "No, no USA, no, no America, no, no to the occupation."
A deputy to radical anti-US Shi'ite cleric Moqtada Sadr was killed in Baghdad as he was driving to the demonstration, a Sadr official said.

And a roadside bomb killed 15 Iraqi soldiers and wounded several others yesterday in Latifiyah, 40km south of Baghdad, a defence ministry official said.

The bomb exploded as a convoy of Iraqi troops passed through the town, he said.
Latifiyah is part of a belt of towns south of Baghdad known as the "triangle of death" for its high rate of murders, bombs and kidnappings.

Latifiyah is part of a belt of towns south of Baghdad known as the "triangle of death" for its high rate of murders, bombs and kidnappings.

In Baghdad, radical preachers called on their congregations to rally in Firdos Square where US troops helped haul down a statue of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

Anti-US protesters from Baghdad's Shi'ite slum of Sadr City congregated in the square, some carrying Iraqi flags.

Ali Hussein, 30, from Sadr, said: "The war has been finished for two years. What did we get? Nothing. Our country has become the centre of terrorism.

"There is no electricity, no services, no nothing.

>>>>>>MORE">>>>>>>>MORE

http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,12807116%5E663,00.html