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Six Shiite pilgrims taking part in a religious pilgrimage were killed and dozens were wounded in insurgent mortar attacks and roadside bomb explosions across Baghdad,Iraqi police officials said.
The attacks took place in at least six locations around the capital as devout Shiites converged on a mosque in the Kazimiyah neighborhood to commemorate the July 7 anniversary of the death of the seventh imam.
Hundreds of thousands of Shiites from around Iraq have turned out in Baghdad for ceremonies marking the eighth-century death of Imam Moussa al-Kadhim. Pilgrims traditionally walk to the twin-domed shrine in Kazimiyah,where the revered saint is buried.
Huge religious processions of Iraq8217;s majority Shiite sect have often been targeted by suspected Sunni insurgents in the past years of sectarian bloodshed that had the nation teetering on the brink of civil war from 2005 to 2007.
Today two pilgrims were killed when a mortar shell landed near them and four died when a roadside bomb detonated. More than 50 people were wounded in attacks around the city,police officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.
Iraqi military spokesman Maj Gen Qassim al-Moussawi told the Associated Press earlier today that security forces were on high alert in the capital,and a vehicle ban was in place across Kazimiyah.
Al-Moussawi said pilgrims are searched for weapons at various points leading to the shrine,and up to 200,000 members of security forces have been deployed along the way.
In 2005,more than 900 people died in a stampede which appeared to have been sparked by a rumor that a suicide bomber was among the more than 1 million people who had gathered at the Kazimiyah shrine to mark the date of the imam8217;s death.
The pilgrimage is not the most important among Shiite ceremonies,but is considered significant.
