Iraqi Shia Leader Appeals for Unity

Iraq’s most influential Shia political leader today called for unity between Shia and Sunni Muslims in a bid to calm sectarian tensions that risk plunging the country into civil war.

A curfew in Baghdad and three provinces appears to have eased the violence that has killed around 120 people since the bombing of the al-Askari shrine in Samarra, one of Shia Islam’s most revered sites, on Wednesday.

In a statement read over national television, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim said those who had carried out the bombing "do not represent the Sunnis in Iraq".

Mr Hakim, who heads the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, instead blamed Saddam Hussein loyalists and followers of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq.
"We all have to unite to eliminate them," Mr. Hakim said.

The number of violent incidents across Iraq appeared to decline today. However, in Basra - where no curfew was in effect - gunmen kidnapped the three children of a Shia politician.

Religious leaders urged the majority Shia community and the Sunnis to attend joint Friday prayers today.

Some 700 people, most of them Sunnis, attended a service at the al-Askari shrine but were turned away by security forces.

Many parts of Baghdad were virtually deserted as police and troops blocked roads, but worshippers were allowed to walk to mosques for midday prayers.

In southern Iraq’s Shia heartland, more than 10,000 people gathered at the al-Adillah mosque in Basra, where the representative of Iraq’s leading Shia cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, called joint prayers.

Gunmen burst into a Shia home in Latifiya, south of Baghdad, and killed five men, Iraqi police said.

Iraqi state television yesterday announced the extension of a night-time curfew in Baghdad and three volatile provinces until 4pm (1300 GMT).

The sectarian violence threatens to derail the US strategy of establishing an inclusive government as a step towards disengagement from Iraq.

The biggest Sunni Arab bloc in parliament yesterday announced it was pulling out of talks on forming a new Iraqi government.

Sunnis are demanding that the Shia-dominated national leadership apologize for damage to Sunni mosques in reprisal attacks.

Sir Jeremy Greenstock, Tony Blair’s former envoy to Iraq, said US-led troops - including around 8,500 British soldiers - should remain in Iraq to promote stability.

"The [Iraqi] army isn’t yet fully formed; the police are not fully effective at the moment," he told BBC Radio 4’s Today program. "It is necessary for them [the US-led troops] to stay to provide some backbone to security."

Sir Jeremy said the situation in the wake of the shrine bombing was "very serious" but he did not believe civil war would erupt.

In London, defense officials from the UK, US, Japan and Australia were meeting today to discuss "the key issues relating to Iraq" a Ministry of Defense spokesman said.

The spokesman said no announcements were expected, but that the withdrawal of forces from Iraq could be discussed.