BAGHDAD, Sep. 11 (DPA/EP) –
At least eleven Iranian pilgrims have died this Sunday in a traffic accident between a truck and a bus in which Iranian pilgrims were traveling to the holy city of Kerbala.
An Iraqi police spokesman confirmed the information in statements to the DPA news agency. The tanker truck collided with the bus on a highway about 100 kilometers south of Baghdad.
The pilgrims traveled to Kerbala through the Arbain, the acts in memory of the death of the third Shia imam, Husain Ibn Ali, grandson of Mahora killed and beheaded during the Battle of Kerbala in confrontation with the troops of the Sunni Umayyad Caliph Yazid I in the year 680.
This year more than 2.6 million Iranian pilgrims have crossed the border to join Shiites from Iraq and other countries in the Arbain, celebrated this Saturday, September 10, and estimates point to a total of 5 million pilgrims .
Authorities in the Iraqi provinces of Najaf and Kerbala have already declared public holidays this week to attend to the millions of pilgrims who will visit Shiite temples in the area.
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