In Iraq, a Ho-Hum Homecoming
Soccer Team's Stars, Fans Absent From Baghdad Celebration

By Megan Greenwell
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, August 4, 2007

BAGHDAD, Aug. 3 -- The Asian Cup soccer champions arrived in Baghdad on Friday evening for a celebration that was closed to the public and did not include the team captain.

Younis Mahmoud, the 24-year-old captain who scored the winning goal in Iraq's victory over Saudi Arabia last Sunday, refused to come to Baghdad, saying he feared for his safety. Two of the team's other stars, Nashat Akram and Hawar Mohammed, also did not attend.

Very few of the players live in Iraq, and the team has not played a game in the country in 17 years. Practices are generally held in Jordan.

"If I go back with the team, anybody could kill me or try to hurt me," Mahmoud said after Sunday's game.

The celebration for Iraq's first-ever Asian Cup championship was held in the heavily fortified Green Zone, preventing the public -- millions of whom are passionate supporters of the team -- from attending. Government and military leaders, including Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, sponsored the gathering, presenting bonuses and other gifts to the players.

Meanwhile, police announced Friday that a senior aide to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani was killed Thursday night in Najaf, the second time an adviser to Iraq's top Shiite cleric has been assassinated in the past two weeks.

Fadhil Akil, who was responsible for collecting religious taxes from Sistani supporters, was shot to death as he walked home from a mosque in Najaf, police said. Sistani's legal adviser, Abdullah Falaq, was slain July 20 in his office next to Sistani's home. In that case, four suspects were arrested, including at least one bodyguard at the cleric's compound.

Sistani, one of the most influential religious leaders in Iraq, was the target of an assassination attempt in January, and aides said they are worried about his safety. Several clerics, politicians and academics have been slain in Najaf in the past several months.

Also on Friday, Iraqi police announced that they had captured a senior member of the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq who is believed to be connected with the bombing of a historic Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad. The minarets of the revered Askariya shrine were destroyed by a bombing attack June 13. The shrine's golden dome was ruined in a February 2006 bombing, which prompted a wave of sectarian violence across the country.

Meanwhile, the U.S. military announced Friday that four troops had been killed in two incidents in Baghdad on Thursday. Three soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in the eastern part of the city, while another was killed in combat in a western neighborhood.

Special correspondent Saad al-Izzi contributed to this report.