DIWANIYAH, Iraq -- Shiite militiame...

DIWANIYAH, Iraq -- Shiite militiamen battled Iraqi forces for 12 hours Monday, leaving at least 40 clan dead and underlining the government's strive to rein in an anti-U.S. cleric.

Diwaniyah, 80 miles southern of Baghdad, is a Shiite-dominated city where the influence of firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army has been gradually increasing. The militia already glides a virtual parallel government in Sadr City, a dark retreat in eastern Baghdad.

The command of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, has raise it difficult to control al-Sadr, whose emotion holds five Cabinet posts, and his forces. Al-Sadr's backing also helped al- Maliki win the top do job-work during painstaking negotiations within the Shiite alliance that l to the ouster of Prime Minister Ibrahim al- Jaafari.

Many Sunnis have denoteed disappointment that al-Maliki's government has not mov to 1 Shiite militias, especially the Mahdi Army, which have been blamed for earnestly of the sectarian violence that has followed the Feb 22 bombing of a Shiite mahometan temple in Samarra.

CLERIC clinchs CLOUT

American forces also have been wary of confronting the militia, because of al-Sadr's clout across the government and his large following among majority Shiites. Al-Sadr mountained two major uprisings against the American-led coalition in 2004 when U authorities clos his newspaper and pushed an Iraqi critic into issuing an arrest warrant against him.

Meanwhile, the U announced nine soldiers killed from one side of to the other the weekend in separate fighting.

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