Shi'ite pilgrims stream home from Iraq rite

By Sami al-Jumaili

KERBALA, Iraq (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands of Shi'ite pilgrims streamed home from Iraq's shrine city of Kerbala on Sunday at the end of an annual holy rite that passed without the factional violence that marred it last year.

Several bomb attacks on pilgrims heading to the rite killed more than 30 people in recent days, but the ritual itself in Kerbala was peaceful, authorities said. Last year Shi'ite militia and police clashed during the pilgrimage, leading to major gunbattles in Kerbala's streets.

At the conclusion of the Sha'abiniya rite overnight, believers crowded the banks of a river that flows into the Euphrates, floating lit candles on the water under a full moon.

Pilgrims then began to pack into buses to leave Kerbala, some 80 km south of Baghdad, which was under the tight watch this week of some 40,000 Iraqi police and soldiers backed by snipers, helicopters and bomb-sniffing dogs.

The pilgrimage marks one of the holiest days in Shi'ite Islam, the birth of Imam Mohammed al-Mehdi. Shi'ites believe the return of the "Hidden Imam", who disappeared in the ninth century, will herald peace on earth.

The throngs of Shi'ites that make such pilgrimages each year underscore the clout wielded by Iraq's religious majority five years after the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

SUICIDE BOMBER