143 killed in Iraq blasts

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Suicide bombers carried out simultaneous attacks on Shiite Muslim shrines in Iraq Tuesday, detonating multiple explosions that ripped through crowds of pilgrims. At least 143 people were killed and 430 wounded -- the bloodiest day since the end of major fighting last May.\nU.S. officials and Iraqi leaders named an al Qaeda-linked Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as a "prime suspect" for the attacks, saying he seeks to spark a Sunni-Shiite civil war to wreck U.S. plans to hand over power to the Iraqis June 30.\nBut some Shiites lashed out at U.S. forces, accusing them of not maintaining security on the holiest day of the Shiite calendar. The blasts in Baghdad and Karbala fanned fear and anger at a time when leaders of the Shiite majority are pressing for more power in a future government after years of oppression under Saddam Hussein.\nThe devastating explosions came on the last day of the 10-day Shiite mourning festival Ashoura commemorating the seventh century martyrdom of the prophet Muhammad's grandson, Hussein.\nThe bombings also happened about two hours before an attack on a Shiite procession in Quetta, Pakistan, killing at least 42 people -- including two attackers -- and wounded more than 160.\nTens of thousands of pilgrims from Iraq, Iran and other Shiite communities were massed around the golden-domed Imam Hussein in the holy city of Karbala and the Kazimiya shrine in Baghdad when the explosions went off around 10 a.m.\nIn Karbala, women tripped over their long, black robes as they ran. Police wept at the sight of the mangled and torn bodies of pilgrims, their blood pooling in the streets.\n"I was walking away from the tea stand when I heard someone shouting 'Allahu Akbar.' I turned my head and saw a tall, bearded man," said Ali Haidar. "A split-second later, he exploded, his clothes flying upward. The sound was deafening. Bodies, feet, arms were everywhere. Pieces of flesh flew at me."\nIn Baghdad, wooden carts for ferrying elderly pilgrims were used instead, as impromptu gurneys, stacked with the wounded and dead. Torn bodies were sprawled across the mosaic-walled courtyard inside the Kazimiya shrine, and thousands of shoes -- left at the shrine's doorstep as the faithful prayed inside -- were blown across the square.\n"I heard a deafening explosion and bodies began to fly and land next to me," said Amar Dawas, sitting atop a pile of tangled mattresses, head down and scratching his left heel.\n"There were also hands and legs which we had to bring down from the roof," said the 24-year-old worker, whose white T-shirt was stained with blood.\nThree suicide bombers attacked Kazimiya shrine, killing 58 and wounding 200, while at least one suicide attacker blew himself up at Karbala, where 85 were killed and 230 were wounded, U.S. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said.\nHowever, a spokesman for Iraq's Governing Council visiting Karbala put the death toll there at 101, including 15 children, with more than 300 wounded.\nIn Tehran, the spokesman for the Iranian Interior Ministry, Jahanbakhsh Khanjani, said at least 22 Iranian pilgrims died and 69 were wounded in the Karbala blasts. He said other Iranians may have been among the casualties at Kazimiya.\nIranians by the tens of thousands have flooded across the common border with Iraq since Saddam's ouster, able to visit the most important Shiite shrines for the first time in decades.\nThe toll could have been worse. A fourth suicide bomber was captured at Kazimiya after his explosives failed to detonate. Police in the southern Shiite city of Basra discovered two women strapped with explosives marching in an Ashoura procession, and other bombs were found near Shiite mosques in Basra and Najaf.\nU.S. intelligence officials have long been concerned about the possibility of attacks during Ashoura. Last month, U.S. officials released what they said was a letter by al-Zarqawi outlining a strategy of spectacular attacks on Shiites, aimed at pitting Shiites against Sunnis in a bloody civil war.\n"The terrorists want sectarian violence because they believe that is the only way they can stop Iraq's march toward the democracy that the terrorists fear," said Iraq's top U.S. administrator, L. Paul Bremer. "They will lose because the Iraqi people want and will have democracy, freedom and a sovereign Iraqi government."\nMembers of Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council quickly tried to quiet sectarian divisions. Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish council representatives urged Iraqis to "maintain unity" to "cheat our enemies of the chance to inflict evil on the nation."\nThe deadly attacks forced the delay of a key milestone in the path toward the U.S. handover -- the planned Thursday signing of an interim constitution approved by the council this week.\nCoalition spokesman Dan Senor said plans for the June 30 handover would not be effected.\n"This was a very sophisticated attack. It was very well coordinated, timed to two significant events" -- the Ashoura ceremonies and the signing of the constitution, Kimmitt said. "This clearly shows the signs of a well-organized group."\nBut much of the outrage of Shiites was directed at the Americans.\n"This is the work of Jews and American occupation forces," a loudspeaker outside Kazimiya blared. Inside, cleric Hassan Toaima told an angry crowd, "We demand to know who did this so that we can avenge our martyrs."\nA mob of Iraqis assaulted U.S. troops and medics who tried to control crowds and help wounded at Kazimiya, pelting them with stones and forcing their convoy of Humvees back into a nearby walled outpost. Two soldiers suffered broken bones. When the Iraqis tried to storm the outpost, U.S. soldiers fired tear gas to disperse them.