By Khaled Farhan
NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr blamed the United States on Friday for the assassination of a lawmaker who belonged to the cleric's parliamentary bloc, killed a day earlier in a bomb attack.
In the Baghdad district of Sadr City, men cried and shouted slogans as they carried and walked alongside Saleh al-Ugaili's coffin, draped in the Iraqi flag, before it was taken to a cemetery in the holy southern Shi'ite city of Najaf.
"The martyr gave most of his time to eject the occupiers ... And for this reason the hand of the hateful occupation and terrorism killed him," Sadr said in a statement as hundreds of supporters gathered to bury Ugaili.
"God is the greatest, America is the enemy of God," mourners chanted in Najaf after Friday prayers.
Ugaili was killed on Thursday when a blast struck his car in the Habibiya district of eastern Baghdad. It was not clear who was behind the attack, which Sadr blamed on the United States. The cleric is opposed to the U.S. presence in Iraq.
There have been several bomb blasts in Baghdad in recent weeks, and police said at least 12 people were killed and 22 wounded on Friday when a car bomb exploded in the commercial district of Abu Dsheer in the south of the capital.
Ugaili's killing prompted condemnations from U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and military commander General Ray Odierno, who called his killing an "attack against Iraq's democratic institutions" and a "heinous crime."
Staffan de Mistura, the United Nations' representative in Iraq, called the killing "an outrageous crime aimed at perpetuating instability in Iraq."
Gunmen clashed with U.S. and Iraqi forces overnight in Sadr City. The U.S. military said there had been one American casualty, but did not say if the soldier had been killed or wounded.
A lawmaker from the Sadrist bloc, which has 30 seats in the 275-seat parliament, said Ugaili's killing could be linked to upcoming provincial elections, due in January.
The polls are expected to see a struggle for power between rival Shi'ite factions in Iraq's oil-rich south.
"The killing could have two reasons. It could be an internal conflict in the Sadrist movement ... or a fight between Shi'ite powers for control of the streets before the polls," said a political science professor at Baghdad University, who declined to be named for security reasons.
Major-General Michael Oates, a U.S. commander in southern Iraq, said on Thursday that U.S. forces feared a wave of assassinations before the polls.
Violence in Iraq has declined to four-year lows in recent months, but bombings and shootings take place daily, especially in Iraq's north.
SECURITY PACT
Four people were killed and at least 15 were wounded when two bombs exploded in the centre of the northern city of Mosul on Friday. The U.S. military says Sunni Islamist al Qaeda is clinging to the city after being forced from havens elsewhere.
U.S. and Iraqi negotiators are in the final stages of negotiating a security pact that will govern the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq once a U.N. mandate expires this year.
Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki -- speaking in Najaf after meeting Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani -- said Washington's request that its troops be sheltered from prosecution in Iraq was one issue that needed to be resolved.
Although Sistani does not comment on politics, Maliki's words after meeting the cleric were notable because Sistani's tacit blessing would almost certainly be necessary to win political support for it.
Sadr's military wing, the Mehdi Army, has launched several uprisings against U.S. forces since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 and has fought rival Shi'ite factions, but in August Sadr extended a year-old cease-fire indefinitely.
(Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim in Baghdad; writing by Mohammed Abbas; Editing by Elizabeth Piper)
