Some Iraqi insurgents agree to reconcile

[NYVet]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080530/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_fighters_no_more_1


BALAD, Iraq - School teacher Raad Mohammed Mahdi used to take on another role after classes: foot soldier in the Sunni insurgency north of Baghdad.

He grew weary of his double life last year and wanted to lay down his arms. The problem was he didn't know how to surrender formally without facing possible jail time.

Last week, Mahdi entered a U.S. military base and signed a form that amounts to a personal truce. More than 140 other men came the next day after learning that soldiers did not detain Mahdi, whose late brother was an insurgent leader.

<snip>

"We are tired of raids. We want to protect our area by ourselves," the 31-year-old teacher said during a recent interview at the base in Balad, a mostly Shiite city near a major U.S. air base about 50 miles north of Baghdad.

"The policy of the American forces has changed. Now the American forces are on the right track. We have trust in them," he said.

<snip>

"There are a lot of guys who kept fighting simply because they didn't have an out," said Lt. Col. Bob McCarthy, commander of the 1st Squadron, 32nd Cavalry Regiment that operates in the Balad area. "At the end of the day, if they've quit fighting we've got to figure out how to let them move forward."

The new reconciliation program comes several months after the Iraqi parliament passed an amnesty law that could free many of the 27,000 detainees held by Iraqis. It's unclear, however, whether the amnesty will speed the release of some of the detainees in U.S. custody.

<snip>

Mahdi's resume reads like a history of the Sunni-led insurgency.

He said he took up arms against the Americans after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. He later joined the Ansar al-Sunnah militant group and expanded his enemy list to include the Shiite-dominated Iraqi security forces and Shiite militias.

"Anybody would defend his country if it was occupied," he said.

<snip>

"That doesn't mean they're waving the American flag or even agreeing with us. They're not cheering us, but they're tired of fighting, tired of sleeping outside."

<snip>

But the 38-year-old also warned the recent overtures for peace could unravel without tangible progress on creating jobs and tackling hardships such as electricity shortages.

"I cannot guarantee 100 percent that they won't resort to weapons again," he said. "But if they were employed, I could."