Basra: Women Coerced to Veil, Shops Attacked

David Delanian writes more on the role of Shiite militias in imposing a mini-theocracy in the southern port city of Basra.

' Menacing groups of men have been stopping cars at the university gates and haranguing women whose heads are uncovered, accusing them of violating Islamic law. Male students have accosted them as they walked to class. As al Asadi spoke to a reporter in a courtyard, a scruffy-looking man handed out fliers that likened uncovered women to prostitutes and murderers. "I fear them," she said simply. '