Iraqi Trade Minister Muhammad Mahdi al-Salih speaks to the press in Baghdad in this Oct . 30, 2002 file photo.

BAGHDAD, April 24 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The United States said Thursday, April 24, it had captured four more former associates of toppled president Saddam Hussein, and warned Iran against any interference in Iraq while sending marines to patrol along their common border.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Shiite pilgrims ended a landmark pilgrimage to the holy city of Karbala that was marked by anti-American protests.

Eleven of Saddam's key officials from the list of 55 "most wanted" have now been detained since the fall of Baghdad on April 9, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said.

The U.S. Central Command named the latest three as the director of military intelligence, Zuhayr Talib Abd al Sattar al Naqib; air defense force commander Muzahim Sa'b Hassan al-Tikriti; and Trade Minister Muhammad Mahdi al-Salih.

In a separate statement, the command said U.S.-led special forces had also captured Salim Sa'id Khalaf al-Jumayli, who had headed the American desk of the Iraqi intelligence Service but was not on the "most wanted" list.

"He is suspected of having knowledge of Iraqi Intelligence Service activities in the United States, including names of persons spying for Iraq," said Jim Wilkinson, a spokesman for the command.

No details were given of their capture.

‘Warning’ Iran

In Washington, President George W. Bush's administration said it had “warned” Iran not to send agents into southern Iraq to push Tehran's brand of Islamic government.

"We have well-known channels of communication with Iran and we have made clear to Iran that we would oppose any outside interference in Iraq's road to democracy," said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer.

"Infiltration of agents to destabilize the Shi'a population would clearly fall into that category," he added amid claims Iran had sent agents across the border to shore up its interests in Iraq.

U.S. marines have been deployed along parts of Iraq's border with Iran to screen traffic for hostile infiltrators, the U.S. military announced Wednesday, April 23.

The Central Command said the patrols have been underway in northeastern Iraq since Monday, April 21, amid new concern that Iranian agents bent on stirring up anti-U.S. unrest among fellow Iraqi Shiite Muslims might be slipping across the frontier.

‘Red Line’

Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi for his part warned the marines not to cross the border, which he described as "red line".

A spokesman for the Iranian opposition People's Mujahedeen, which claims to have battled Iranian Revolutionary Guards inside Iraq, said a ceasefire reached with U.S. forces allowed the Iraq-based group to remain armed and continue its struggle against the government in Tehran.

"We have been, are and will continue to fight the fundamentalist Iranian regime" from Iraq, said Mohsen Nadi.

Meanwhile, Shiites flocked to Iraq's holiest city of Karbala Wednesday on the last day of a pilgrimage banned for more than 20 years under Saddam.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims, many beating their heads and chests and flogging their backs with chains, converged on the city south of Baghdad to mourn the Prophet Mohamed's grandson Imam Hussein, who was beheaded there in 680 AD after defeat in a battle over the leadership of the Islamic world.

In a development likely to further inflame tensions between US forces and Iraq's majority Shiite community, a prominent cleric charged he had been beaten by U.S. troops.

Iraq's US ‘civil administrator’, Jay Garner, acknowledged Wednesday that Washington was facing "some staged demonstrations" against its rule, but insisted most Iraqis "are glad we are here."

But the Iran-based Supreme Assembly of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and former foreign minister and opposition figure Adnan Pachachi, both said the country does not need Garner's administration and that power should be returned to the Iraqi people.

The retired general returned Thursday to Baghdad from a tour to assess how to rebuild Iraq after 24 years of Saddam's rule, more than a decade of UN sanctions, and three weeks of U.S.-led bombing.

The United States meanwhile postponed the second of a planned series of meetings in Iraq of Iraqi opposition figures that had been set for Saturday, April 26, in Baghdad, a State Department official said.

Meeting Postponed Because Of Horrific Weather

The meeting, at which the composition and selection of an Iraqi interim government was to be discussed, will now take place on Monday, the official said, blaming expected "really horrific" weather in the capital.

On the humanitarian front, the first UN international staff to return to the country since the start of the war entered northern Iraq.

The Doctors Without Borders (MSF) group said Baghdad hospitals are in dire straits, but that there was no large-scale health crisis in the country.