in Iraq, the government of the Islamic Republic has forbidden Iranian pilgrims to travel individually to Iraq and required them to make their trips only as part of organized group tours.
The odd thing about the new order is that all the attacks on Iranian pilgrims are made against organized tours. The Iran Times had not seen any reports of attacks on individual Iranian pilgrims.
Most attacks are made on Iraqi-owned buses that pick up the pilgrims at the border and carry them to the several pilgrimage sites in Iraq. The buses are easily identifiable as Iranian pilgrim trips. Many attacks take place on the highways, while others have occurred at rest stops along the highways. Some have targeted the actual pilgrimage destinations, where suicide bombers aim for groups speaking Farsi. The attacks have been going on for years, but seem to have increased in the past year, perhaps because there are now fewer American troops in sight to attack.
The Interior Ministry issued a decree last week that said: “All pilgrimage trips to Iraq by Iranian pilgrims holding individual visas but not on accompanied tours supervised by Iran’s Hajj Organization are banned.”
The curious order prompted speculation that the regime feared some pilgrims going on their own to Iraq were not really pilgrims but regime opponents traveling to Iraq for training, arming and funding by the American forces there. Others attributed the order to “control freaks” in the regime who merely want to maximize their oversight of what Iranians are doing.
The announcement said the order was intended to protect the pilgrims from terrorist attacks and to avoid “illegal gatherings” near the border. The announcement did not describe any “illegal gatherings” noted in the past.
Iranian pilgrim tours are being attacked every few weeks in Iraq. Many fail completely or result in just a few injuries. But others have resulted in dozens of deaths.
