Baghdad  - Thousands of Iraqi Shiites gathered in the central Iraqi city of Karbala on Wednesday in an annual religious observance known as Ashura.

The pilgrimage starts on the first day of the Islamic Hijri year and culminates on the 10th day, known as Ashura, when Shiites mourn the death of Imam Hussein, grandson of Islam's prophet Mohammed, at the 7th century battle of Karbala.

Men marched down the streets of Karbala, whipping their backs with chains and sobbing as blood covered their bodies and faces. Others tapped their chests in a steady rhythm.

Women were dressed in black, as a symbol of mourning, regularly wailing and shouting.

The ritual is considered a display of devotion and a kind of self- purgation. The event was forbidden during the regime of Saddam Hussein, which repressed public display of worship rituals by Iraq's Shiite majority.

The number of pilgrims was estimated at one million, including more than 55,000 non-Iraqi Shiites.

For the first time ever in Iraq, security authorities prevented female pilgrims from entering Kadhimiya city, where the shrine of Imam Musa al-Kadhim is located in the Baghdad district bearing his name.

A suicide bomb blast on Sunday killed at least 40 people and wounded 79 in the Kadhimiya area of northern Baghdad. Most of the victims were Iranian pilgrims.

But the day was calm, as about 100,000 Iraqi and US forces were scattered all over the city to protect the worshippers.

Shiite pilgrims have been a repeated target of extremist Sunni Muslim groups operating in Iraq, especially during their annual celebrations of religious events. (dpa)