Bombs wrecked the dome of a major Shi'ite shrine in the Iraqi city of Samarra on Wednesday in an apparent sectarian attack that sparked demonstrations and calls for revenge by angry crowds.

The country's top Shi'ite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, called for protests against the attack, and Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a Shi'ite Islamist, went live on television to declare three days of mourning.

Jaafari, under pressure from the United States to bring Sunni minority leaders into a coalition government to avert a sectarian civil war, called for unity, describing the blasts as an attack on all Muslims.

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