At least one million pilgrims prayed in the Iraqi holy city of Samarra on Friday in a show of force called by radical Shiite cleric Moqtada...
At least one million pilgrims prayed in the Iraqi holy city of Samarra on Friday in a show of force called by radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, as Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki called for forgiveness for allies of Saddam Hussein. Samarra, a Sunni-majority city 80 miles (125 kilometers) north of the capital and a former hotbed of Iraq's insurgency, houses a major Shiite mausoleum blown up by suspected al-Qaeda forces in 2006. Sadr, head of the Mahdi army, last month urged the faithful to restore a traditional pilgrimage halted since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and to pray at Samarra's golden-domed shrine to commemorate the death of the 11th imam, Hassan al-Askari, at his mausoleum. The commemoration falls this year on March 6. Iraqi television stations reported the gathering swelled to more than a million.
