NAJAF, Iraq, Aug 19 (AFP) - Moqtada Sadr's Shiite Muslim fighters will happily die as martyrs, a senior aide of the militia leader said Thursday, after an Iraqi minister ordered them to disarm or face a military offensive.
Meanwhile loud explosions and gunfire echoed through the historic heart of Najaf, where US and Iraqi forces have surrounded the Imam Ali mausoleum where Sadr's Mehdi Army is holding out, and plumes of black smoke spewed into the sky.
Minister of State Kassem Daoud had nothing to do with a peace mission from Iraq's key national conference, which Sadr had accepted, Ali Smeisim told a news conference in the holy city of Najaf afternoon.
"He is not part of the negotiations. If there is a US conspiracy orchestrated by US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld and US agents respond to it, then we'll be happy to be martyrs of this nation," he said.
Earlier Daoud said an offensive against the Mehdi Army would be launched within hours unless the the radical Shiite leader publicly disarmed, as another government official accused Sadr of trickery.
Annother aide to Sadr, Sheikh Aws al-Khafaji, told Al-Jazeera television, "We will not hand the keys of the mausoleum to the American forces because it will be a shame that will haunt us forever."
Khafaji, the head of Sadr's office in the southern Shiite city of Nasiriyah, added, "We will not hand them to the Iraqi police or national guards who have violated sacred shrines and spilled the blood of Muslims."
Khafaji said Sadr followers would only hand the keys to Shiite authorities, particularly followers of venerated Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.