Zarqawi urges Iraqi Sunnis to shun Shi'ites - Web

DUBAI, June 2 (Reuters) Al Qaeda's leader in Iraq Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has called on fellow Sunnis to reject any reconciliation with ''infidel'' Shi'ites, according to an audio tape posted on the Internet.

''O Sunnis! Prepare to get rid of the infidel snakes and their poison ... and don't listen to those advocating an end to sectarianism and calling for national unity. This is a weapon to get you to surrender,'' said the speaker yesterdat on the tape who sounded like Zarqawi.

Iraq's new national unity government vowed last month to rein in violence and heal the country's sectarian wounds.

The audio tape, posted on an Islamist Web site often used by Iraqi insurgent groups, could not be authenticated.

The speaker blasted Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, as the ''leader of infidelity and atheism'' and said his followers were more concerned about honouring their own saints than protesting against cartoons of Islam's Prophet Mohammad published in Danish and other European newspapers.

''We did not see them rise up with the same fervour when blasphemous pictures of the Prophet were published because they prefer their own leaders to God and his Prophet,'' he said.

The speaker accused Shi'ite groups and government forces of being responsible for numerous attacks on Sunnis and their places of worship.

He suggested that Shi'ites themselves were behind the February bombing of a Shi'ite shrine and other attacks which touched off a wave of sectarian killings and revenge attacks.

''The attacks were a charade ... that revealed their (Shi'ites') hatred of the Sunnis,'' the speaker said.

The tape, which was issued in three parts totalling about four hours, covered what the speaker said were examples of the Shi'ites' enmity towards Islam throughout history.

The speaker criticised a militia loyal to radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr for stopping their fight against U.S.

forces after uprisings in 2004 against U.S. troops.

The speaker also attacked Lebanon's Shi'ite guerrilla group Hizbollah, and said majority-Shi'ite Iran had helped the United States in Afghanistan and was in contact with Washington over Iraq.

Zarqawi's last message was a rare video issued in April, in which he denounced the new Shi'ite-led government which also include minority Kurds and Sunnis and said it was set up to help Washington find a way out of its predicament in Iraq.

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