By 365gay Newscenter Staff
(Baghdad) A radical Shiite cleric has called for the “depravity” of homosexuality to be eradicated but his spokesperson later said that that the remark should not be taken as a fatwa to kill gays.
Moqtada Sadr made the call on Thursday during a seminar of clerics, police and tribal leaders.
There has been growing anti-gay violence in Iraq. Last month another Shiite cleric, Sattar al-Battat, repeatedly condemned homosexuality during Friday prayers, saying Islam prohibits homosexuality. Homosexual acts are punishable by up to seven years in prison in Iraq.
The following week, the bodies of two gay men were found in Baghdad’s Shiite slum of Sadr City. Several days later, a third man was found dead on the outskirts of Sadr City. By the end of the month, another three bodies were found and police said four other men were found tortured but alive.
Amnesty International said that in addition to the violence in Sadr City, 25 suspected gays had been killed in recent months in Baghdad.
A group calling itself “Brigades of the Righteous” has posted signs around Sadr City listing the names of alleged homosexuals and threatening to kill them.
Moqtada Sadr’s spokesperson on Friday said that the cleric’s call for the eradication of homosexuality was not an endorsement of the violence.
“Al-Sadr rejects this type of violence,” said Sheikh Wadea al-Atabi. “And anyone who commits violence [against gays] will not be considered as being one of us,” Al-Atabi said.
“The only remedy to stop [homosexuality] is through preaching and guidance. There is no other way to put an end to it,” he said.
In addition to Al-Sadr’s remarks Thursday, another Shiite leader at the meeting said that homosexuality “is a disaster that has come to the community,” and a tribal leader from Sadr City, said: “Everybody has to work to preserve the morals of young people from the corrupt phenomena of the West.”
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