A team of Iraqi ministers flew to Najaf today to discuss plans for rebuilding the holy city after three weeks of fighting that killed hundreds, drove oil prices to record highs and sparked a political crisis.
The five ministers drove through a shattered urban landscape of buildings pockmarked with bullet holes and streets littered with wreckage and ammunition to the Imam Ali shrine, where Shia militants were holed up during their uprising.
Fighting between the Mehdi Army militia of rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and US and Iraqi forces ended on Thursday when Iraq 's most revered Shia leader, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, returned from his London hospital bed to broker a peace deal.
"We have come to Najaf to consolidate the peace settlement we reached and to congratulate Sistani," Minister of State Kasim Daoud, who led the delegation, told Reuters.
The ministers arrived outside Najaf in two Black Hawk helicopters and were driven into its old city in a convoy led by police cars with sirens wailing.
The ministers held a 20-minute meeting with Sistani to discuss the government's plan to rebuild Najaf and to restore water, electricity, sewage and hospital services.
Violence elsewhere in Iraq showed the size of the task facing interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi as he prepares for elections in January.
In the Shia slum district of Sadr City in Baghdad Iraqis clashed with US troops today, and in Falluja,
US planes bombed targets in an eastern district.
US forces have mounted several air raids on Falluja this month, and say they are aiming to destroy foreign fighters loyal to al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
In the mixed Sha and Sunni Muslim town of Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, six policemen were killed and five wounded when gunmen opened fire on them, police said.
And in the northern city of Mosul, gunmen shot dead a university lecturer, ambushing her as she drove to work, police and witnesses said. Police also fought a gunbattle with US troops in the oil hub of Kirkuk, police Colonel Farhat Qader said, describing the incident as "a mistake". He said two policemen were badly wounded in the battle and six others arrested by US troops.
A mortar attack in the town of Baiji, north of Baghdad, killed an Iraqi civilian and wounded a civilian and a policeman, the US military said. Several people were also wounded in mortar attacks in Baghdad.