Iraqi authorities say construction workers laying down a pipeline south of Baghdad have stumbled on a mass grave in Karbala, a holy city for Shi'ite Muslims.
Officials in Karbala say Tuesday the bodies were uncovered during excavation work in the city center, near Imam Hussein's mausoleum, the holiest Shi'ite shrine.
Police have cordoned off the site and about 20 corpses have been removed from the mass grave for forensic examination and DNA testing. The remains are believed to be those of Shi'ite Muslims, victims of Saddam Hussein's bloody suppression of a Shi'ite uprising after the Gulf War in 1991.
Mass graves containing thousands of bodies have been discovered at a number of sites since Saddam was overthrown in 2003.
Most of the burial grounds were either in the Shi'ite-dominated southern part of the country or the Kurdish northern region.
Information for this report is provided by AFP.
