Shrine damaged in clash between US and Shi’ite militia

ONE of the most sacred shrines of Shia Islam was damaged during clashes between US forces and radical Shi’ite militiamen that killed at least 13 Iraqis, some of them civilians.

A representative of Iraq’s most powerful Shi’ite cleric has accused rebel cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s militia of deliberately attacking the revered shrine in Najaf.

Ayatollah Mohammed Baqer al-Mehri said the al-Sadr militia fired a mortar shell at the dome of the Imam Ali Shrine, but missed and hit a wall.

He called the attack “a cowardly act,” and said al-Sadr militia should not use the shrine for storing weapons and as a sanctuary.

“We want to tell the world, and America, that Muqtada al-Sadr is not one of us, and this is a conspiracy against Shi’ites so that we don’t get any rights,” al-Mehri said, referring to Shi’ite demands for greater political representation in the new Iraq.

Al-Mehri represents Iraq’s Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, the pre-eminent Shi’ite religious leader in Iraq.

After the fighting in Najaf eased, people gathered at the shrine to look at the damage. The inner gate, leading into the tomb of Imam Ali Ibn Abu Talib, appeared to have been hit by a projectile. Debris was scattered on the ground.

Al-Jazeera television showed a torn veil covering the gate, and damage on the wall around it. It also showed several injured people lying on the floor of the mosque compound, and an angry crowd of more than 100 shouting and shaking their fists at the site.

Al-Sadr supporters accused the Americans of firing mortars at the mosque, and said 12 people were injured in the mosque compound. In Baghdad, US Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt told Al-Jazeera that the shell that fell on the shrine was not American and was not fired by coalition forces.

In Baghdad, a suicide car bomber near a hotel wounded at least five Iraqis. The target of the blast, about 100 yards from the Australian embassy, was not immediately clear.

Late yesterday, insurgents fired rockets from an apartment block at a police station in central Baghdad, triggering huge explosions and wounding a US soldier.

Meanwhile, the top US military officer in Iraq, Lt Gen Ricardo Sanchez, will be replaced as part of what officials claim is a command restructuring that has been in the works for several months.