Increased security in Iraq for Shi'ite Ashoura
Ceremonies mark the slaying of Hussein, considered by Shi'ites Mohammad's true successor. Banned under Saddam, celebrations in recent years have been marred by violent attacks. In Pakistan, 22 people have already died, and in Afghanistan, at least 6.
Baghdad (AsiaNews) With their heads shaven, beating and wounded themselves, almost a million people have gathered in Kerbala, the holy city for Shi'ites worldwide situated 110 kilometres south of Baghdad, home to the mausoleum of Hussein, son of Ali, cousin and son-in-law of Mohammad, slain there with a group of companions who refused to surrender to preponderant Sunni force. For the estimated 130 million Shi'ites in the world, today is Ashoura, the ceremonial commemoration of pain, which draws hundreds of thousands of pilgrims.
As of yesterday, Iraqi security forces and U.S. air surveillance are at work to prevent that this year's ceremony, banned under the Saddam regime, is transformed by terrorists into another occasion for massacre. Ashoura is also an occasion for an increase in tension between Shi'ites and Sunnis. Today's celebrations have already seen 22 deaths in Pakistan and at least 6 in Afghanistan.
Traffic in Baghdad is at a standstill: police have closed bridge on the Tigris and have considerably increased the number of checkpoints, seeking to thwart suicide missions by Sunni extremists and foreign terrorists. But already six people in the capital have been injured by shots fired by unknown gunmen, while preparatory ceremonies were taking place. An unmanned U.S. aerial drone, used for overhead surveillance during the ceremonies, has fallen on a Shi'ite neighbourhood of Sadr City.
The previous day, Shi'ite minister of higher education, Sami al-Mudhafer, escaped injury from a car bomb that wounded two of his bodyguards.
Some 8,000 Iraqi security officers are currently in Kerbala. Checks are being carried out in hotels and, around the Hussein Mosque, police are thoroughly frisking pilgrims. Tents have been set up for checks on women. Other tents have been set up for barbers who are shaving the heads of male pilgrims who wait their turn in long line-ups. The area around the mosque has been sealed off even to official vehicles.
Ceremonies began at dawn, and by midday, some one million participants had gathered according to General Razeq Abd Ali Al Tayi, the city's chief of police.
Pilgrims marched toward the Hussein Masoleum inflicting bleeding wounds on themselves with whip lashes and knife blades, in remembrance of the massacre in the year 680 of 72 Hussein followers.
Security forces are on high alert: last year, 44 people were killed in an attack in Kerbala; the previous year 170 pilgrims met their death in Baghdad.
Shi'ites account for about 10% of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims. Of these, some 120 million (including Persians and Arabs) live in the Middle East. They are the majority religion in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Azerbaijan and Bahrain and are a significant minority in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
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