The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
The Spokesman-Review Newspaper The Spokesman-Review
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883
Current Temperature
45°F
Current Conditions
Broken clouds
View complete weather report

Color Scheme

Subscribe now

Sectarian violence raging in Iraq, despite security

An Iraqi soldier mans a checkpoint stopping all vehicle traffic on a bridge in central Baghdad. Iraqi authorities have initiated a four-hour driving ban on Fridays, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)
Borzou Daragahi and Saad Khalaf Los Angeles Times
An Iraqi soldier mans a checkpoint stopping all vehicle traffic on a bridge in central Baghdad. Iraqi authorities have initiated a four-hour driving ban on Fridays, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)

BAGHDAD, Iraq – At least a dozen Shiite worshippers in the capital city and the leading Sunni Arab cleric of southern Iraq were killed Friday in a new round of sectarian violence.

The attacks tarnished the Muslim day of worship despite a highly publicized security plan unveiled this week that included a Friday vehicle ban in the capital meant to halt the targeting of religious sites.

Sheik Yossef Hassan, the most prominent Sunni religious figure of the country’s south and prayer leader of Basra’s Great Mosque, was assassinated by three gunmen on foot as he drove to the port city’s main Sunni house of worship.

The gunmen approached Hassan’s car in central Basra, pumped four bullets into his chest and wounded his two bodyguards before walking away. The shooting came 45 minutes before the cleric was to deliver Friday prayers, a colleague said.

Southern Iraq has fallen under the sway of Shiite militiamen and political parties with ties to Iran. Sunnis fear they are being targeted by the Shiite-dominated government’s apathy if not approval.

“We don’t want to accuse anybody, but we really want to ask the government, ‘Where is your new security plan?’ ” said Sheikh Abdul Baset Subaii, a Basra spokesman for the Muslim Scholars Association, a Sunni Arab clerical group.

President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd who maintains friendly ties with both Washington and Tehran, acknowledged on al-Arabiya satellite television channel Friday that some Shiite militias continue to receive support from Iran, but said Iraq has long been a playground for foreign influence.

“There was a time when Iran funded us,” said Talabani, once a leader of the Kurdish rebellion against Saddam Hussein. “But as the president of the Republic of Iraq I reject that and ask that Iran not interfere in the affairs of Iraq.”

In Friday’s outbreak of violence, Iraqi authorities said a suicide bomber smuggled explosives in a shoe into Baghdad’s Buratha Mosque, a major Shiite house of worship, killing at least 12 Iraqis and injuring at least 17 more.

The blast, an apparent attempt to kill firebrand Shiite politician and prayer leader Jalaledin Saqir, charred the mosque’s main hallway and splattered blood on ornamental turquoise-tiled walls and a staircase the cleric uses to enter his office.

Security at the mosque had been tightened after scores of people were killed and injured in a triple suicide bombing last April. Bombings of mosques and shrines, which U.S. and Iraqi officials say brought the country to the precipice of civil war several weeks ago, had subsided in recent weeks.