Latest Bloodshed

58 killed in Iraq on Shi'ite holy day

(AP)
Updated: 2007-01-31 09:53

Nawal Hassan said she pleaded with her husband not to go to the ceremonies but went with him when he refused to stay home. Her husband was wounded.

"I had a feeling that something might happen because terrorists are always targeting Shiites," she said.

Khanaqin's mayor, Mohammed Mulla Hassan, said no outdoor religious events would be held in the city until further notice to avoid more bloodshed. He was referring to the anniversary Friday of Imam Hussein's burial and ceremonies marking the 40th day after his death.

Under Saddam Hussein, pilgrims from Iran were banned and even Iraq's Shiites, who comprise about 60 percent of the country's 27 million people, were restricted from performing the Ashoura rituals. After Shiites gained political power following his ouster, Shiite political parties have encouraged large turnouts as an affirmation of Shiite clout.

That has embittered many Sunni Muslims, who frown on Shiite rituals of self-flagellation and public grief.

Also Tuesday, the government announced the arrest of a provincial leader of al-Qaida in Iraq. The terror group's late leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi encouraged attacks on Shiite civilians, considering them heretics and collaborators with the Americans. Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the arrest took place in Beiji in Saddam's home province of Salahuddin.

He said 59 others, including a Libyan, were arrested in a series of raids in Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said in remarks published Tuesday that he hopes sectarian militias will be dissolved and the Sunni insurgency ended within six months.

Al-Maliki made the optimistic prediction in an interview with the Arabic newspaper Al-Hayat as US and Iraqi forces prepare for a security crackdown in Baghdad - the third attempt within a year to curb sectarian violence.

"The militias have to end and be transferred to political organizations and any competition with the state in its attempt to bring about security must end," said al-Maliki, who owes his job in part to the backing of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, leader of the biggest Shiite militia, the Mahdi Army.

The US military said a Marine was killed Monday in fighting in Anbar province, an insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad, while an American soldier died in an accident northwest of Nasiriyah.