IRAQ: IRAQI'S MOURN AYATOLLAH AL-HAKIM KILLED IN CAR BOMBING OF THE IMAN ALI MOSQUE

Record ID: 358576

  • Title: IRAQ: IRAQI'S MOURN AYATOLLAH AL-HAKIM KILLED IN CAR BOMBING OF THE IMAN ALI MOSQUE
  • Date: 30th August 2003
  • Summary: (U4) NAJAF, IRAQ (AUGUST 30, 2003) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. WIDE OF NAJAF SKYLINE 0.02 2. SLV COFFIN STRAPPED ON THE TOP OF A CAR/ TRAFFIC ON STREETS 0.13 3. WIDE OF MEN IN THE STREETS OF NAJAF MOURNING ALONGSIDE MOSQUE 0.20 4. SLV OF PEOPLE MOURNING, HOLDING PICTURES OF AYATOLLAH MOHAMMED BAQER AL-HAKIM, LEADER OF THE SUPREME COUN
  • Embargoed: 14th September 2003 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: NAJAF, IRAQ
  • Country: Iraq
  • Reuters ID: LVABOCFLOTVRH7WBQHUSNGA5AS0F
  • Story Text: Iraqis mourned in Najaf the slaying of a
    leading Shi'ite Muslim cleric and scores of his followers,
    killed in a car bomb attack.




    Iraqis mourned on Saturday (August 30) the slaying
    of a leading Shi'ite Muslim cleric and scores of his
    followers, killed in a car bomb attack which dealt a major
    blow to U.S. efforts to pacify postwar Iraq.

    As the country began three days of national mourning
    for the victims of the blast in the Shi'ite holy city of
    Najaf, weeping relatives gathered to collect the bodies of
    their loved ones from the mortuary and carried coffins
    through the streets.

    The chief pathologist said the death toll from the
    attack which brought carnage to the area around the Imam
    Ali mosque -- one of the holiest Shi'ite sites -- right
    after Friday prayers now stood at 87, with more than 200
    people wounded.

    In central Baghdad, more than 2,000 Shi'ites marched to
    lament the killing of Ayatollah Mohammed Baqer al-Hakim,
    leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in
    Iraq (SCIRI), in the deadliest attack in postwar Iraq.

    Some of the demonstrators carried pictures of the slain
    cleric, who returned to Iraq from exile in Iran a few weeks
    after U.S. forces entered Baghdad on April 9.

    Shi'ites make up around 60 percent of Iraq's 26 million
    population. Hakim was the most prominent of their leaders
    to back cooperation with the U.S.-led occupying authorities
    running the country after the war that toppled Saddam Hussein.

    Many Shi'ites have blamed diehard supporters of Saddam,
    a Sunni Muslim who repressed the Shi'ite community, for the
    attack. But some analysts have also suggested rival Shi'ite
    factions opposed to Hakim's moderate stance could be to
    blame.

    Thousands of people thronged the streets outside the
    Imam Ali mosque on Saturday morning, some carrying coffins
    wrapped in black shrouds with verses from the Koran.

    The mosque contains the tomb of Ali, the son-in-law and
    cousin of Prophet Mohammed, the founder of the Islamic
    faith.

    The United Nations headquarters in Baghdad and the
    Jordanian embassy have both been hit by major bomb attacks
    in recent weeks, killing scores of people including the
    chief U.N. envoy to Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello.

    Toby Dodge, an Iraq expert at Britain's Warwick
    university, said the Najaf attack was a blow to the
    occupiers' efforts to bolster moderate Shi'ites.

    Hakim's SCIRI, which operated out of Iran until Saddam
    was ousted, has a seat on Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing
    Council. Radwan al Qadari, a leading Shi'ite cleric told
    Reuters that he hoped the council could restore order to
    make Iraq a safe to live.

    "We hope that the rule of law will be established by
    the Iraqis, by the interim council, to take over the
    security of Iraq and to deal with the criminals who have
    failed to establish Iraq and to make Iraq an unsafe place
    to live in, and to make people live in fear as they did
    during the past 35 years as they have under the rule of
    Saddam Hussein," the Shi'ite cleric said.

    Iraq's U.S.-led occupiers have been struggling since
    the official end of major combat in Iraq against daily
    guerrilla attacks which have killed 65 U.S. and 11 British
    soldiers. But they now have to deal with much larger-scale
    violence.




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