Latest bombings in Iraq kill at least 25 Shiite pilgrims (Roundup)

Feb 3, 2010, 16:34 GMT

Karbala, Iraq - At least 25 people were killed and more than 100 injured Wednesday in the latest deadly bombings to target Shiite Muslim pilgrims flocking to the southern Iraqi city of Karbala.

In the deadliest attack, a man driving a motorbike in a crowd of pilgrims detonated the explosives strapped to his body, killing at least 25 people and injuring 115, police told the German Press Agency dpa.

In the southern Baghdad neighbourhood of al-Amal, a smaller bomb injured three people near a Shiite mosque, police told the Aswat al- Iraq news agency. The victims had been preparing for the pilgrimage to Karbala.

Millions of pilgrims have been making their way on foot to the holy city of Karbala to visit the shrine of the Prophet Mohammed's grandson, Hussein, for annual Shiite holiday of Arbaine.

Authorities have deployed more than 30,000 military and police officers on the roads leading to the city, where some 5 million visitors have already gathered for Friday's annual ritual, according to security officials.

Security authorities are cooperating with US military air support to protect the record number of visitors in the Shiite holy city, a security source said.

On Tuesday, two people were killed and 11 injured in a bomb blast targeting pilgrims in Kantarat al-Salam region, east of Karbala, according to witnesses.

Safeguarding pilgrims during major Shiite festivals remains a challenge for security forces. Such events were forbidden under the regime of Saddam Hussein, which suppressed any public display of worship rituals by the country's Shiite majority.

Meanwhile, deadly violence continued on the outskirts of the troubled city of Mosul in the north of the country on Wednesday.

An 8-year-old girl was fatally shot in the Yarmuk district on the edge of the city when police and militants exchanged fire after police caught them planting a roadside bomb. Three policemen and three insurgents were killed in the gun battle, police said.

Mosul and its environs are among the most ethnically diverse, and dangerous, areas of Iraq. Despite successive security operations in the past year that police say have netted hundreds of suspected insurgents, the city remains the scene of near-daily and generally deadly attacks.