By Muhsen Hussein, Laith Salman

   BAGHDAD, Aug. 21(Xinhuanet) -- Hopes for peaceful solution is flourishing in Najaf standoff as talks was underway on Saturday on the transfer of the Imam Ali mausoleum from the Mehdi Army loyal to radical Shiite leader Muqtada Al Sadr to followers of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

   Sheikh Ahmad al-Shaibani, Sadr's top aide, told reporters near the holy mausoleum that "as you see now I am going to the office of Ayatollah Sistani. Arrangements are being made so that you could see peace before you."

   Earlier, Sadr's militiamen has handed over the keys of the mausoleum to representatives of Iraq's top Shiite cleric Sistani, who is in a London hospital for treatment of a heart problem.

   "We handed over the keys to Sistani's office" and final details of the transfer are worked out, Shaibani added.

   Najaf, some 160 km south of Baghdad, is a holy site for Muslims and one of the holiest Shiite pilgrimage sites in the world. Sadr's Mehdi fighters took over the holy mausoleum and turned it into military headquarters after clashes with US forces. 

   The two weeks of fierce fighting resulted in hundreds of Iraqi victims and the destruction of the city which is almost abandoned.

   The Iraqi interim government wanted to impose its authority by dissolving the all armed militia and that the police and National Guards forces would impose security. Consequently, the government forces became part of the bloody fight in the holy city of Najaf.

   While the government announced that it intends to attack the city and dismiss Mehdi Army from the shrine and from Najaf, Sadr announced that his fighters would fight to death.

   After hard mediations from both Iraqi and international figures,the two sides agreed to solve the crisis in a way that is dignifying for both of them.

   Instead of carrying out the government's condition to announce through the media withdrawal of Mehdi Army and handing over their weapons, Al Sadr made another move that was described as clever to save his own dignity that the keys of the shrine are handed over to Great Ayatollah Sistani.

   The handing over of the keys mean that the Mehdi Army members would withdraw from their posts in the shrine and accepting the solution put by a committee of the national conference, which held last week in Baghdad that the Mehdi Army is dissolved and changed into a political entity with the right to participate in the political operation.

   It could be said that Saturday witnessed a solution for the crisis of Najaf with any victory of either parties, Sadr's Mehdi Army and the Iraqi government backed by US forces, observers said.

   For Sadr, the solution would mean that the victory was not for the government, as it and the US forces wished, for even if the Mehdi Army had withdrawn from Najaf because the Sadr militaimen really exist in other sensitive places, like Basrah, the biggest city in the south which controls the oil exports, and Umarah, Nasiriyah, and Sadr City in Baghdad.

   Accepting the solution without announcing the defeat of Sadr would also be dignifying for the government as it is the original demand of the authorities to maintain security and order of the country.

   Meanwhile, solving the crisis this way would also mean a great victory for another party, Sistani, who was working from behind the curtains to solve the crisis peacefully.

   After Al Sadr had been trying to underestimate Al Sistani and accuse him of being silent, the handing over of the keys to Sistani is an admittance of his great status in the Iraqi society.

   The Shiite Scholars League in Iraq considered in a statement that the solving of the crisis this way proves that the religious references are more capable of solving the problems than the artillery, tanks and machine guns.

   However, Sadr and its Mehdi Army may remain one of the sources of bloody conflicts, clashes and turbulence.

   The Mehdi Army would guard the shrine even after handing it over to Sistani, Sadr's top aide Shaibani told reporters Saturday, adding it "will keep defending the shrine and Najaf" and "the Americans will not be allowed into Najaf."  Enditem