Battles across Iraq's south in crackdown

By Aref Mohammed

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered Shi'ite militiamen to surrender on Wednesday as a crackdown on followers of powerful cleric Moqtada al-Sadr spread across southern towns leaving a ceasefire in tatters.

Sadr, whose truce last year was praised by U.S. forces for curbing violence, called for talks to end the crackdown on his followers, the biggest military operation that Iraqi forces have undertaken without U.S. or British combat units.

Scores of people have been killed and hundreds wounded in the fighting, which began in the southern oil hub of Basra and spread to Shi'ite parts of Baghdad where Sadr's followers hold sway and the towns of Hilla, Kut and Diwaniya in the south.

Maliki, in Basra to oversee the campaign there, said fighters would be spared if they surrendered within 72 hours.

The assault is a chance for his government to prove it can impose its will and allow American forces to withdraw. But it also runs a risk of unleashing more violence after a year that saw security in Iraq improve dramatically.

"We have been living for the last hours in hell. We have spent most of the time hiding under the staircase," said Basra resident Faris Hayder, 28. "We haven't seen anything like this since the foreign troops arrived in 2003."

Battles which began on Tuesday in Basra resumed with heavy gunfire and explosions. A health official said 40 people had been killed and 200 wounded in the city by Wednesday morning.

A Reuters correspondent in Kut, 170 km (105 miles) south of Baghdad, heard gunfire and mortar impacts and saw buildings and cars aflame. Police said at least 18 people died in clashes there, including a baby girl.