Three-day curfew imposed on Baghdad to protect pilgrims

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's authorities ordered cars off the streets of Baghdad for three days from Tuesday to protect Shi'ite pilgrims gathering for a major religious festival in the capital.

An Interior Ministry spokesman said on Monday the ban was aimed at thwarting attacks on pilgrims, vulnerable as they walk to the shrine of Imam Musa Khadim in the northern district of Kadhimiya.

Nearly 1,000 Shi'ite pilgrims were killed in a stampede during the ceremony in 2005, when a crowd heading towards the shrine was panicked by rumors of a suicide bomber.

It was the greatest loss of Iraqi life in a single incident since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003.

Last year gunmen, some on rooftops, ambushed the pilgrims as they walked in their tens of thousands to the shrine, killing at least 20 and wounding 300.