In the highest one-day toll since the American invasion, more than 800 people died on Wednesday, after rumours of a suicide bomber led to a stampede in a vast procession of Shia pilgrims crossing a bridge on their way to a shrine in northern Baghdad. Most of the dead were crushed or suffocated, witnesses said, but many also fell or jumped into the Tigris River after the panicking crowd broke through the bridge’s railings. The pilgrims were among a throng of hundreds of thousands who had converged on the capital over the preceding day to mark the anniversary of the death of Imam Musa al-Kadhim, one of Shia Islam’s holiest figures. Fear had begun spreading through the crowd an hour earlier, after insurgents fired rockets and mortars near the shrine, killing seven pilgrims and wounding two dozen, and leading to a counter-attack by American military helicopters. The stampede itself appears to have been caused by unfounded rumours of a man wearing a suicide belt in the crowd. At least 841 people were killed and at least 323 were injured, an Interior Ministry official said. In the aftermath of the disaster, with tens of thousands of pilgrims continuing their procession, black-clad Shia women could be seen keening over dead bodies in the streets of Khadimiya, the Shia neighbourhood where Imam Kadhim’s shrine is located.On the bridge itself, hundreds of sandals and shoes lay in piles, abandoned by the fleeing crowd. Local hospitals were overwhelmed, with the halls lined with dead bodies, some of them drenched in river water. Insurgents have often attacked Shias during religious processions over the past two years, and Iraqi authorities had blocked off roads throughout northern Baghdad beginning Tuesday evening, anticipating attacks on the hundreds of thousands of Shias who were converging on the capital. • Shias were gathering at Kadhimiya in Baghdad for martyrdom anniversary of Musa Al-Kadhim • Panic as word spread that suicide bomber was about to blow himself up • Stampede on bridge; at least 841 dead, toll may rise to 1,000; most victims women and children • Many jumped off bridge, drowned in river • Interior Minister Bayan Jabor and top Shia officials blamed insurgents for stampede, saying a terrorist spread the suicide bomber rumour • Earlier, at least seven people were killed in three separate mortar attacks as crowds headed for Kadhimiya • Little known Sunni group Jaysh al-Taefa al-Mansura said it was behind mortar attacks • Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari declared three days of mourning
