Ramadi--the next Fallujah?

RAMADI, 24 February (IRIN) - Residents of Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province some 100 km east of Baghdad, have started to flee the city following the latest offensive launched by US Marines and the Iraqi army.

The military have carried out raids in the province over the past few days in an attempt to crack down on insurgents, with the main focus of operations eing Ramadi, a rebel stronghold.

Worried that the offensive could proceed as it did in nearby Fallujah, where he majority of the city's population was forced to flee during a near hree-month long campaign, many Ramadi families are taking personal effects and food supplies and heading to relatives' houses in the capital, or to the same camps where residents from Fallujah fled.

A number of checkpoints have been set up around the city of 400,000 and a curfew has been established. It runs from 2000 to 0600. Vehicles are being inspecting carefully and any suspect is being taken for further interrogation, Marines' spokesman Lt-Col Paul Brathen told IRIN.