22 February 2006
An explosion in Iraq has destroyed the golden dome of one of the most revered shrines in Shia Islam.
Wednesday's early morning blast at the Askariya shrine in Samarrah, 150km north of Baghdad, devastated the tombs of the tenth and eleventh of the 12 Imams believed by Shia to have been infallible successors to the prophet Mohammad.
Early reports suggested armed insurgents, possibly in Iraqi police uniforms, entered the shrine and left explosives. US troops and Iraqi police cordoned off the area and began house to house searches. There were also reports of fatalities.
The attack appears to be a deliberate provocation of Iraq's Shia community, who make up around 55 per cent of the population and comes after two deadly explosions targeting Shia civilians in Baghdad on Monday and Tuesday.
Mouwafak al-Rubaie, national security advisor, blamed Sunni militants of Ansar al-Sunnah, a group linked to al-Qaeda that has been responsible for a trail of violence in Iraq since the 2003 US-led invasion. Mr Rubaie told Al Arabiya satellite television such militants intended to "to pull Iraq toward civil war".
Thousands of demonstrators quickly took to the streets of Samarrah and wider protests are expected. There has been growing concern among Shia Muslims, in Lebanon and Iran as well as Iraq, at attacks by mainly Sunni insurgents on Shia civilians and religious figures in Iraq.
Ayatollah Sistani, Iraq's most senior Shia cleric, called immediately for seven days of mourning and asked people to protest peacefully in their home cities rather than travel to Samarrah, which has a majority Sunni population.
Ayatollah Sistani has consistently urged his followers to show restraint and not be goaded by attempt to incite sectarian war.
The Sunni Endowment, a government body that maintains Sunni shrines, condemned the blast and said it would send a delegation to Samarrah to investigate.
The Askariya shrine in Samarrah is the tomb of both Imam Ali bin Mohammad, who died in 868AD, and Imam Hassan bin Ali, who died in 872AD and was the father of Imam Mohammad bin Hassan, whom Shia believe went into hiding in 941 and will return one day as 'the Mahdi' to inaugurate a period of just rule on earth before the Day of Judgement.
Gareth Smyth in Tehran
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