Shiite militiamen battled with U.S. and Iraqi troops Friday in the holy city of Karbala, and the fighting left nine people dead and nearly two dozen wounded, local officials said. Separately, the U.S. military said another American soldier was killed in fighting, raising to eight the number of troop deaths reported over the past two days, the Associated Press reported. The fighting in Karbala, 80 kilometers (50 miles) south of Baghdad, broke out as the joint U.S.-Iraqi force conducted a pre-dawn raid on the house of a leader of the Mahdi Army militia, which is loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, prompting the militia fighters to open fire, according to a police officer and a local council member. The militia leader Razzaq al-Ardhi and his brother were arrested in the clashes, which lasted nearly two hours, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to release the information.
