Feb 28, 2008, 9:52 GMT
Baghdad - Dressed in black and green stripes and carrying colourful banners, thousands of Iraqi Shiite Muslims commemorated Thursday the killing of Imam Hussein, the grandson of prophet Mohammed, amid heightened security in the Southern city of Karbala, media reports said.
Many Shiite pilgrims from across Iraq carried food and water supplies and walked for hundreds of kilometres to the city, following centuries-old rituals, in the hope that walking would earn them more rewards and blessings from God, al-Sharqiya news channel reported.
The former regime of Saddam Hussein banned all Shiite religious ceremonies, including the ritual of travelling on foot to the shrine of Karbala, traditionally held to be the tomb of Hussein, who died in the Battle of Karbala in 680 AD.
The battle was one on a series of conflicts between Sunnis and Shiites.
The event is marked by heightened security in the city, 120 kilometres south of the Iraqi capital. The government has deployed 100,000 police and troops across southern Iraqi cities in preparation for the ceremony a week ago.
Security forces arrested on Wednesday a suicide bomber amongst the Shiite visitors in a checking point northern the holy city, the Iraqi news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI) said.
'We were suspicious about the suicide bomber after noticing slight stuffing around his arms and abdomen. We immediately arrested him before he blew himself up amongst the visitors,' sources told VOI.
Iraqi forces also arrested three suspects during a large inspection operation in southern Karbala in the early hours of Wednesday.
Weapons and explosives were also confiscated, according to VOI.
Karbala was the scene of deadly clashes during a religious ceremony in August between Shiite militias, in which at least 50 people were killed and hundred injured.
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