WASHINGTON— Taking military action against Iran could put President Bush on a collision course with Congress, leading Democrats and a Republican lawmaker cautioned Friday following Bush's threat of unspecified consequences for alleged Iranian meddling in Iraq.
The U.S. military said on Friday that firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr had returned to Iran, where he had spent several months earlier this year as the United States was sending 30,000 additional troops to the Baghdad area. Al-Sadr's office said he was still in Iraq.
Powerful Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr is in Iran and not in complete control of the militia that owe allegiance to him, the U.S. commander in Sadr's main stronghold in Baghdad said on Friday.
Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr is reported to be back in Iran and elements of his Mahdi Army militia appear to be operating outside his control, a US military commander in Baghdad said Friday.
Iran's influential former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani expressed disappointment on Friday at the lack of progress in talks with the United States aimed at restoring security in Iraq.
US President George W. Bush sternly warned Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki Thursday against cozying up to Iran, amid what Washington sees as unsettling signs of warming Baghdad-Tehran relations.
Iranian officials say Iraq will only be stable once U.S. troops have left, Reuters reports. "Iran fully backs Iraq's popular government," Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told the visiting Iraqi PM on Thursday.
Iran's leaders on Thursday told visiting Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki that US troops must leave his country, in talks that reinforced growing bilateral ties and sparked unease in Washington.
WASHINGTON | Taking military action against Iran could put President Bush on a collision course with Congress, leading Democrats and a Republican lawmaker cautioned Friday.
President Bush charged Thursday that Iran continues to arm and train insurgents who are killing U.S. soldiers in Iraq, and he threatened action if that continues.