BAGHDAD, 14 June 2007 — Saboteur bombers destroyed the two minarets of Samarra’s Askaria Mosque early yesterday, site of a 2006 bombing that shattered its famous golden dome and unleashed a wave of retaliatory sectarian violence that still bloodies Iraq. Sunni extremists of Al-Qaeda were quickly blamed.
The repeat assault on the Shiite shrine immediately stirred fears of a new explosion of intra-Muslim bloodshed, and prompted the 30-member bloc of Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr to suspend its membership in Iraq’s Parliament, threatening a deepened political crisis.
To try to ward off an upsurge in Iraq’s unending violence, Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki quickly imposed an indefinite curfew on vehicle traffic and large gatherings in Baghdad — at first set for 3 p.m. yesterday, later delayed to 6 p.m.
Before the curfew took hold, arsonists set fire to a Sunni mosque in western Baghdad, and a Shiite shrine was blown apart north of Baghdad, police said. Later police reports told of two Sunni mosques bombed south of the capital, one destroyed and the other with its minaret destroyed.
It wasn’t clear how the attackers evaded the Askaria Mosque’s guard force to mount yesterday’s stunning operation, detonating the blasts around 9 a.m., and bringing down the two slender golden minarets that flanked the dome’s ruins at the century-old mosque. No casualties were reported in the attack.
Policemen at the mosque were subsequently detained and will be questioned as part of the investigation, Al-Maliki said. Later, the Interior Ministry said members of “a terrorist group” had been arrested and were being interrogated. The statement did not elaborate.
In addition to ordering the curfew, Al-Maliki’s office said, the Iraqi leader met with US Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus and US Ambassador Ryan Crocker to ask that American reinforcements be sent into Samarra, 95 kilometers (60 miles) north of Baghdad, and US troops here in the capital be put on heightened alert.
A few hundred US soldiers are stationed around Samarra to provide security, though they rarely enter the mosque’s perimeter and leave protection of the mosque to Iraqi forces.
The US command had no immediate comment on military moves. Crocker and Petraeus later released a statement calling the attack an “act of desperation” and “a deliberate attempt by Al-Qaeda to sow dissent and inflame sectarian strife among the people of Iraq.”
US military spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Garver said the command was “obviously very concerned about this and our primary goal is to prevent any violence of the kind that broke out after the last bombing.”
Al-Maliki later, in a nationally televised address, said he had ordered security forces to beef up protection of mosques across Iraq. The Shiite prime minister also warned against reprisal sectarian attacks.
An official close to the prime minister, citing intelligence reports and speaking on condition of anonymity, said yesterday’s bombing was likely the work of Al-Qaeda, whose militants have recently moved into Samarra from surrounding areas. The powerful blasts shook the town, sending a cloud of dust billowing into the air, said Imad Nagi, a storeowner 100 meters from the mosque. “After the dust settled, I couldn’t see the minarets any more. So, I closed the shop quickly and went home.” Another resident, Abdul-Khali Mohammed, predicted violence in the capital: “The Shiite militias now will seize this opportunity to kill Sunni families in Baghdad.”
Police in the mosque area began firing into the air to keep people away, witnesses said, and Iraqi Army and police reinforcements poured in.
In western Baghdad, Shiite militiamen carrying light weapons fanned out across Jihad, a mixed neighborhood, police said. No violence was immediately reported.
