BEIRUT, July 19: A rocket strike near a shrine in Damascus killed a custodian of the site on Friday, activists and residents said, in an attack that could inflame sectarian tensions in Syria's 28-month-old conflict.

Opposition activists and residents said shrapnel killed Anas Romani, the respected caretaker of the gold-domed Sayyeda Zainab shrine in the capital's southern suburbs, a renowned pilgrimage destination for Shias from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and beyond.

There were conflicting reports about damage to the shrine.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has a network of activists across Syria, cited sources as saying the shrine's blue-tiled sanctuary had been hit. But a local resident said the rockets landed outside the mosque.

The Syrian government accuses rebels of targeting the shrine of Sayyeda Zainab, which is now protected by hundreds of people from Iraq and the powerful Lebanese Hezbollah group.

The rebels say they are only attacking pro-Assad forces in the area, though many in their ranks use sectarian rhetoric against Assad's supporters.

Syria's uprising-turned-civil war has sectarian dimensions that risk spilling over into neighbouring Iraq and Lebanon, which have both suffered their own communal conflicts.—Reuters