The U.S. military said yesterday that terror-supporting Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr had returned to Iran, where he had spent several months earlier this year as the United States was sending 30,000 additional troops to the Baghdad area. Sadr's office said he was still in Iraq.

Col. John Castles, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team, disclosed the information in a teleconference with Pentagon reporters and said it was based on U.S. intelligence reports. He did not elaborate.

A spokesman in Sadr's headquarters in Najaf, south of Baghdad, denied the U.S. assertion. "The Americans are just trying to find out where Sadr is," he said.

Sadr came under heavy pressure to order his fighters not to confront the Americans as the U.S. troop surge began in February. He is believed to have complied, then fled to Iran.

Meanwhile, the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously yesterday to give the United Nations an expanded political role in Iraq, promoting reconciliation between rival factions.