by Hassan Abdulzahrah
NAJAF, Iraq, Aug 5 (AFP) - Five people were killed and a US helicopter was shot down amid heavy fighting between US troops and Shiite Muslim militiamen in the central Iraqi holy city of Najaf on Thursday, officials said.
Fighting continued throughout the day, despite a brief reprieve. By early evening, an AFP correspondent said US jets began shelling militia positions in Najaf and planes could be heard roaring overhead in Baghdad.
Sounds of clashes on the ground ceased during the shelling, hours after the city was subject to a barrage of heavy gunfire and mortar fire.
A helicopter attached to the 11th Marine Expeditionary unit came down in the region, a US military spokesman in Baghdad said.
"A UH-1 marine helicopter was shot down at about 11:45 am (0745 GMT)," he said, adding that the crew was recovered alive but the extent of their injuries was unknown.
Separately, a US soldier was killed and five were wounded when their convoy was attacked with rocket-propelled grenades and gunfire near Najaf, the military said. The soldiers had been redeployed to Najaf from north of Baghdad.
The death brought to more than 680 the number of US troops killed in action in Iraq since the 2003 US-led invasion.
A doctor was killed and four other staff members were seriously wounded when five rockets were fired at the Najaf general hospital, near the scene of the fighting in the 1920 Revolution Square, a health ministry official said.
Medics said a total of four people were killed and 19 were wounded in the clashes which began overnight when Shiite radical leader Moqtada Sadr's Mehdi Army militia attacked Iraqi police.
Interior Minister Falah al-Naqib told a Baghdad news conference that the government would not negotiate with the militias.
"We are not going to go into any negotiations. We are going to fight these militias. We have enough power and enough strength to stop and kick those people out from the country," he said.
When asked whether he had a message for Sadr and his men, Naqib said: "Don't kill yourself. They are killing themselves."
Sadr aides accused US troops of damaging a minaret of the city's holiest shrine, the mausoleum of Imam Ali, which has remained a Sadr stronghold since his militia waged a deadly uprising against US forces earlier this year.
"The occupation forces and those collaborating with them attacked the Imam Ali mausoleum and we call on Muslims to help defend this holy place," militiamen shouted over loudspeakers before the unrest later died down.
Hossam al-Husseini, a spokesman at Sadr's office, told AFP that the minaret closest to the Tussi gate had been hit in the fighting.
Marines branded two overnight attacks on police an "overt violation" of a June ceasefire agreement, which drew a line under Sadr's spring uprising.
The fighting is the worst since US-led multinational forces on Saturday arrested Sheikh Mithal al-Hasnawi, Sadr's representative in Karbala, another Shiite holy city south of Baghdad.
US forces' arrest of one his key deputies helped trigger Sadr's first standoff with the coalition.
Although the June truce allowed Iraqi police to restore their presence in Najaf, the area around the mausoleum of Imam Ali has remained a Sadr stronghold.
The truce also failed to address the fate of the illegal Mehdi Army and the issue of an arrest warrant issued against Sadr in connection with the murder of a rival cleric last year.