The New Nation - Internet Edition

Reuters, Islamabad

Plagued by mounting attacks by Islamist militants loyal to al Qaeda, Pakistan now faces a second wave of violence as its minority Shi'ite Muslims prepare for their annual mourning period.

The 40-day Shi'ite mourning period, expected to begin on Thursday, has become a lightning rod for sectarian violence and comes as the country is still reeling from the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in a gun and bomb attack. The Interior Ministry said 35 districts in the country had been declared "sensitive" and all security agencies had been put on high alert to avert sectarian violence during the mourning period, known as Moharram. "We appeal to all citizens to exercise vigilance and extend full cooperation to the security agencies," said ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema. Moharram marks the death anniversary of Imam Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Mohammad, who was killed in a battle with political rival, Yazid, in A.D. 680 in the Iraqi city of Kerbala. The climax of Moharram is the 10th day, known as Ashura, when worshippers flog themselves with steel-tipped flails or slash their bodies with knives to express solidarity with Hussein. Moharram processions have come under attack by Sunni sectarian militants in recent years.

Pakistan saw a surge of religious violence in the 1980s with the emergence of militant groups, most of them Sunni, funded by the United States and Saudi Arabia to fight Soviet forces in Afghanistan and Shi'ite radical groups following the success of the 1979 Islamic revolution in majority Shi'ite Iran.

While ordinary Sunni and Shi'ite Pakistanis live side-by-side, radicals from the two sects have inflicted a bloody toll in tit-for-tat assassinations and bomb attacks since then.

Last year, a suicide bomber blew himself up among policemen escorting a Moharram procession in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 11 people, most of them policemen.