The New Nation - Internet Edition

Reuters, Kerbala

Iraqi forces imposed tight security on the city of Kerbala as 2.5 million pilgrims marked the climax of a major Shia rite on Saturday, a day after gunmen attacked worshippers and police in other southern cities.

Police said sporadic fighting between security forces and gunmen from a messianic Shia cult called the "Soldiers of Heaven" had broken out again in the cities of Basra and Nassiriya on Saturday. There was no information on casualties.

Nearly 70 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in gunbattles on Friday after gunmen from the cult launched nearly simultaneous attacks in the two cities.

In Kerbala, pilgrims thronged streets and narrow alleyways for the end of the 10-day Ashura ritual, in which Shi'ites mourn the slaying over 13 centuries ago of the Prophet Mohammad's grandson Imam Hussein near the holy city.

Among the pilgrims were hundreds of men wearing white robes, who marched through the streets striking their heads with swords to show their grief at the killing of Imam Hussein.

Blood flowed down their robes. Others beat their chests to the sound of drums and religious chants. Medics carrying first aid kits walked through the crowd, ready to staunch head wounds.

Imam Hussein's death in 680 entrenched the schism between Shia and Sunni Muslims over whom they recognized as the successors of Mohammed.

The split still sharply divides Iraq, with tens of thousands killed in sectarian fighting since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, although violence has dropped in recent months.

Officials said 25,000 Iraqi police and soldiers were deployed across Kerbala, 110 km (70 miles) south of Baghdad.

"The security situation in Kerbala is under control," Kerbala police chief Brigadier-General Raad Shaker told Reuters. Iraqi helicopters circled over Kerbala while pilgrims were frisked up to 10 times before they could reach the focus of the ceremonies, the Imam Hussein and Imam Abbas shrines in the heart of its Old City. Crowds, including black-clad mourners flagellating themselves, jammed into a courtyard that links the two mosques.

"I am very happy to see these security measures, but I am afraid something may happen at any moment," said Jaber Yusif, 43, who said he had traveled from the nearby city of Hilla.

In the northern city of Kirkuk, a bomb killed two Shia pilgrims heading to a mosque for Ashura, police said.

The governor of Kerbala province said 2.5 million people were in the city for Ashura, one of the holiest events in the ShiaMuslim religious calendar.

Iraqi security forces had launched major operations across mainly Shi'ite southern Iraq to protect pilgrims, but clashes erupted in Basra and Nassiriya on Friday.

A statement from the prime minister's office said a number of "heretics" had been detained after they attacked Ashura processions in Basra and tried to seize a municipal building.

Security officials said police had thwarted similar attacks in Hilla on Friday by detaining 26 "terrorists."

The "Soldiers of Heaven" cult was once led by a man who claimed to be the mahdi, an Islamic messiah-like figure.

A man who said he was from the movement told Reuters in Basra their fighters had decided to attack security forces on Friday because of persecution he said the cult had suffered.

The "Soldiers of Heaven" cult fought a major battle with Iraqi and U.S. security forces a year ago near the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf. The government said at the time the cult had planned to kill top Shi'ite clerics at the peak of Ashura.

Ashura has been a target in the past for Sunni al Qaeda militants who view Shi'ites, a majority in Iraq but a minority in the Muslim world, as heretics.

The ritual was severely curtailed under Saddam Hussein, a Sunni Arab. Shi'ites have dominated politics since his ouster.

A paramilitary surveillance helicopter flies during a Shi'ite religious procession ahead of the Ashura festival in Karachi January 19, 2008. Pakistani police said on Saturday they had averted a disaster with the arrest of five militants planning to attack Shi'ite Muslim processions with cyanide and suicide bombs. Ashura, a 10-day-long event, commemorates the death of Prophet Mohammad's grandson Iman Hussein in a battle in the Iraqi city of Karbala 1,300 years ago.