Saudi authorities today blamed militants linked to Al-Qaeda for an unprecedented attack that killed six Shiite worshippers, including children, and stoked sectarian tensions in the Sunni-dominated kingdom.
Masked gunmen in Saudi Arabia's east late Monday killed at least six Shiites as they celebrated Ashura, the last day of the Muharam, one of the holiest festivals of their faith.
Interior Ministry spokesman General Mansur al-Turki told Saudi media the attackers were "followers of the deviant ideology", using a term often used to describe Al-Qaeda.
The day after the attack two Saudi policemen and two suspects allegedly linked to the incident died in a shootout in Qassim region, north of the capital Riyadh.
Officers rounded up 15 suspects in several cities after the initial shooting in the Shiite-populated and oil-rich Eastern Province.
Radical Sunni groups consider Shiites heretics and have targeted them elsewhere in the region, including attacks that killed more than 40 people in Baghdad in the 48 hours preceding the peak of Ashura yesterday.
The Ashura commemorations marked the killing of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed, by the army of the Caliph Yazid in 680 AD- an event that lies at the heart of Islam's sectarian divide into Shiite and Sunni sects.
Activists in the region gave AFP the names and ages of seven people they said had been gunned down. Five of them were teenagers, including 15-year-old Mohammed Husain Al-Basrawi, and the youngest victim, Mahdi Eid Al-Musharef, was aged nine.
The activists also named 12 people they said were wounded.
The interior ministry gave a different toll of six dead, up from five reported initially. Police said nine were wounded.
