SAMARRA, Iraq -- A large explosion heavily damaged the golden dome of one of Iraq's most famous Shiite shrines today, spawning mass protests and triggering reprisal attacks against Sunni mosques. It was the third major attack against Shiite targets this week and threatened to stoke sectarian tensions.

Shiite leaders called for calm, but militants attacked Sunni mosques and a gunfight broke out between Shiite militiamen and guards at the offices of a Sunni political party in Basra. About 500 soldiers were sent to Sunni neighborhoods in Baghdad to prevent clashes between Shiites and Sunnis, Army Capt. Jassim al-Wahash said.

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A leading Sunni politician, Tariq al-Hashimi, said 29 Sunni mosques had been attacked nationwide. He urged clerics and politicians to calm the situation 'before it spins out of control.'

A government statement said 'several suspects' had been detained and some of them 'might have had been involved in carrying out the crime.'

No group claimed responsibility for the 6:55 a.m. attack on the Askariya shrine in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, but suspicion fell on Sunni extremist groups such as al-Qaida in Iraq led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The shrine contains the tombs of two revered Shiite imams, descendants of the Prophet Muhammad.

The Interior Ministry said four men, one wearing a military uniform and three clad in black, entered the mosque and detonated two bombs, one of which collapsed the dome into a crumbly mess and damaged part of the shrine's northern wall.

Police said late this afternoon no casualties had been found.

U.S. and Iraqi forces in Samarra surrounded the shrine and searched nearby houses. Five police officers responsible for protecting the mosque were taken into custody, said Col. Bashar Abdullah, chief of police commandoes.

Demonstrators then gathered near the shrine, waving Iraqi flags, Shiite religious banners and copies of the Muslim holy book, the Quran.

'This criminal act aims at igniting civil strife,' said Mahmoud al-Samarie, a 28-year-old builder. 'We demand an investigation so that the criminals who did this be punished. If the government fails to do so, then we will take up arms and chase the people behind this attack.'

Religious leaders at other mosques and shrines throughout the city denounced the attack in statements read over loudspeakers.

In Baghdad, National Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie blamed religious zealots such as al-Qaida, telling Al-Arabiya television the attack was an attempt 'to pull Iraq toward civil war.'

The country's most revered Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, sent instructions to his followers forbidding attacks on Sunni mosques, especially the major ones in Baghdad. He called for seven days of mourning, his aides said.

The Sunni Endowment, a government organization that cares for Sunni mosques and shrines, condemned the blast and said it was sending a delegation to Samarra to investigate.

Shiite leaders in surrounding countries, including Iran's most influential cleric body, the Qom Shiite Seminary, also responded quickly.

'Ayatollahs in Qom have condemned the explosion and announced one day of public mourning,' Hashem Hosseini, head of the seminary, told state-run television.

Large protests erupted in Shiite parts of Baghdad and in cities throughout the Shiite heartland to the south.

In Basra, Shiite militants traded rifle and rocket-propelled grenade fire with guards at the office of the Sunni-led Iraqi Islamic Party. Smoke billowed from the building.

Merchants in the holy city of Najaf closed their shops, and about 1,000 people marched through the streets waving Iraqi flags and shouting religious slogans.

In Baghdad's Sadr City, thousands of Shiites, some brandishing Kalashnikov rifles, marched through the streets shouting anti-American slogans.
From Associated Press