Slain Iraq cleric is buried in haste

THE BODY of Ayatollah Mohammed Sadeq al-Sadr, the most popular leader of the Shia Muslims of Iraq, was hastily buried on Saturday as the Iraqi government tried to stifle further protests over his assassination. In Baghdad, security forces were reported to have killed or wounded several demonstrators.

Ayatollah al-Sadr, shot dead with his two sons in the holy city of Najaf at the end of last week, is the third spiritual leader of the Shia faith, to which 55 per cent of Iraqis belong, to be assassinated in Iraq in the past year.

Supporters of the murdered clerics say they were the victims of government death squads.

The Iraqi Ministry of Information claimed Ayatollah al-Sadr was killed by people, some of whom had been arrested, wanting to "sow sedition among the Iraqi people".

But in the past, none of the killers of the Shia clerics have been convicted, despite the holy cities of Najaf, Kerbala and Kufa being the most heavily policed in Iraq.

The exact circumstances of the assassination on Friday are not known. Relatives are unable to speak openly on the phone from Najaf, a city on the Euphrates 100 miles south-west of Baghdad, and military units have surrounded the area to prevent mourners gathering.

Ayatollah al-Sadr, appointed by the government as religious leader of the Shia in 1992, has been an increasingly vocal critic of Saddam Hussein's policies in recent months.

Although he never mentioned the Iraqi leader by name, he distanced himself from the government to which he had once been close. He had strong support among the Shia youth, hundreds of whom usually accompanied him to protect him from attack.

He was also revered by many of the Shia tribal leaders, whom he asked to implement Islamic law. If they agreed to do so he appointed them Islamic leader of their tribe. He had representatives in all the main Shia cities and towns and even appointed judges to adjudicate tribal disputes asking people to go to them rather than government courts.

The government clearly considered Ayatollah al-Sadr and his following a serious threat. He gathered large crowds of worshippers in Kufa last year when he called on people to attend mass prayer.

In a confrontation with the government on 5 December, Ayatollah al-Sadr asked Muslims to walk to the shrine of the Shia martyr Imam Hussein in Kerbala. He only called off the march when the government massed troops, security men and armed members of the ruling Baath party around the city.

The Iraqi government has shown itself much more worried by dissent within the Shia clergy, with their wide popular appeal, than by the Iraqi opposition based abroad. In 1991 after the Gulf War the Shia heartlands of southern Iraq rose up in a rebellion which came close to overthrowing Saddam.

Ayatollah al-Sadr, was the cousin of a Shia religious leader executed by Saddam along with his sister in 1980.

On 21 April last year, Ayatollah Murtada Borujerdi was shot dead by an assassin as he walked home from prayers in the shrine tomb of Imam Ali.

Two months later, on 18 June, the son of Ayatollah Mirza Ali al-Gharavi, another spiritual leader, was worried that his father had not returned from praying in Kerbala, 60 miles to the north of Najaf. When he drove to look for him he found his body in a car, along with several relatives, riddled with bullets.

As with Ayatollah al-Sadr, the government insisted that the bodies be buried immediately. An Iraqi who followed the case said: "The police were not interested in an autopsy, blood samples, investigating the time of death or anything else."