SADDAM'S ASSASSINS BLAMED FOR DAYLIGHT ATTACK FROM SUVs
BAGHDAD, (Agencies): Gunmen firing from SUVs seriously wounded a member of Iraq's Governing Council on Saturday as she was preparing to leave for the UN General Assembly meeting in New York. It was the first attempt on the life of a member of the US-backed council and occurred as major US allies pressed for a greater UN role in bringing stability to this fractured country.
Aquila al-Hashimi, one of three women on the 25-member council and a leading candidate to become Iraq's UN representative, was reported in critical but stable condition with wounds in the abdomen after the 9 am attack, which took place near her home in western Baghdad.
Members of her security detail said the assailants fired from two SUVs, missing her car with a rocket-propelled grenade before opening fire with Kalashnikov assault rifles. She was rushed to the al-Yarmouk Hospital for surgery and was later moved in a convoy of American armored vehicles and military ambulances to the US military hospital at Baghdad International Airport. "She is fine," said Haitham al-Husseini, an adviser to council member Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, a fellow Shiite. "She is in stable condition." Three of her bodyguards were also wounded, according to Mohammed Abdul Ghany, a security official at the hospital.
Baghdad police commander Brig Gen Ahmed Ibrahim told The Associated Press that no one had been arrested in the brazen daylight attack, and he refused to say who might be behind it. However, US troops and Iraqis who cooperate with them have been targeted in a guerrilla-style insurgency that the United States blames on loyalists of ousted leader Saddam Hussein. Al-Hashimi, a former diplomat, is the only former member of Saddam's Baath Party on the council, which was established by the US-led coalition in mid-July to put an Iraqi face on the process of rebuilding the country. Ahmad Chalabi, the president of the Governing Council for September, said al-Hashimi's attackers "were remnants of the Baathist regime and Saddam's assassins."
"The members of the Governing Council and ministers will not be intimidated by the terrorists," Chalabi said in a statement. "They will continue to do their patriotic duty to move Iraq towards freedom, democracy and sovereignty." Al-Hashimi has emerged as a leading foreign policy figure on the council. She was part of a delegation that addressed the United Nations in July and she was preparing to head again to New York for a General Assembly session on Tuesday where the Iraqi council will try to assume Iraq's seat. If the delegation receives the seat, many UN diplomats expect al-Hashimi would be named Iraq's representative. Chalabi said in his statement that the council delegation would attend the UN session, but did not say whether al-Hashimi would be replaced.
Horrific
L. Paul Bremer, the US civilian administrator for Iraq, said he was "shocked and saddened by this horrific and cowardly act." "This senseless attack is not just against the person of Aquila al-Hashimi. It is an attack against the people of Iraq and against the common goals we share for the establishment of a fully democratic government," Bremer said in a statement.
In London, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw deplored "the senseless act of violence" and pledged that "this cowardly act" against a member of the council "will not stop them from achieving their goal." Last month, a Shiite Muslim leader - Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim - was assassinated in a bomb blast in the holy city of Najaf south of Baghdad. The attack, widely thought to be the work of Saddam's supporters, killed at least 85 people. Al-Hakim's Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the biggest anti-Saddam opposition group, is represented on the Governing Council by al-Hakim's brother, Abdel-Aziz.
The continuing security crisis has raised questions about America's stewardship of Iraq since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations May 1. Since then, 82 American soldiers and 11 Britons have been killed in hostile encounters. That has led the Bush administration to appeal to other countries for troops and funds to help in reconstruction and security. However, many nations have balked, citing the need for a UN mandate. On Saturday, leaders of Britain, Germany and France called for a significant UN role in Iraq and a quick transfer of power to the Iraqis. However, no proposed timetable for a transfer of power was announced.
In Saturday's attack, a neighbor of al-Hashimi's, Khola Ibrahim, said she was in her kitchen when she "heard shooting, very heavy shooting." Another neighbor, Saba Adel, said al-Hashimi's brother - who acted as one of her bodyguards - knocked on her door crying out, "My sister, my sister!" Adel said she saw another bodyguard lying on the sidewalk wounded in the arm and leg. "He looked in terrible condition," she said.
Wounded
Meanwhile, five US soldiers were reportedly wounded in a spate of attacks at trouble spots in north and central Iraq on Saturday with an explosion and an exchange of gunfire hitting the flashpoint town of Fallujah. Witnesses and the US military said rockets and bombs were used against the occupying forces, extending a series of hits from forces loyal to the ousted Baath Party since a new audiotape attributed to ousted dictator Saddam Hussein was released last Wednesday.
Three US soldiers were wounded when rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) were fired at their transport trucks in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, shopowner Abdulhakim Othman said. At around the same time, another US military truck came under RPG attack in another district of Mosul, said Mohammad Badreddin, a resident of the city. But it was not clear if there were further casualties. The attacks were launched shortly after an explosion was heard across Fallujah, 50 kilometres (30 miles) west of Baghdad, at about 10:20 am (0620 GMT). Gunfire erupted immediately afterwards that attack.
The explosion occurred shortly after the main highway and a second access route, both linking the capital to Fallujah, were reopened after being cut by hundreds of troops and vehicles entering the city's outer area. One witness said troops blocked the exit and entry points to Fallujah at about 9:00 am Saturday (0500 GMT) and traffic had backed up "for kilometres" heading into the town.
However, the witness said the roads were reopened after 10:00 am as the troop convoys divided into two lines and were deployed to separate US bases on the southern and western perimeters of the city. Iraqi police rushed to the scene and said an oil tanker had been destroyed by the blast but the US military in Baghdad could not immediately confirm the latest strike in Fallujah. However, the military confirmed an additional two US troops from the 82nd Airborne Division were injured Friday at Ramadi, 110 kilometres (about 70 miles) west of the Iraqi capital.
Their convoy was attacked with an "improvised explosive device" and the wounded were evacuated to a nearby military hospital. Most attacks have erupted west and north of the capital and appear to have escalated since a purported message from Saddam urging renewed Iraqi resistance was broadcast on television last Wednesday. The next day, three US soldiers -- also from the 82nd Airborne -- were wounded in an attack near Ramadi and three vehicles destroyed in a bomb and small arms attack.
Then on Friday US soldiers rounded up 55 people around Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, 175 kilometres (110 miles) north of Baghdad, after an ambush left three American soldiers dead and two wounded. A sweep of the area also turned up an assortment of AK-47 machineguns, pistols and RPG launchers. Relations between locals and occupying forces deteriorated further shortly after Saddam apparently made his latest broadcast when an Iraqi teenager was killed and six other people wounded in Fallujah, witnesses said.
The soldiers opened fire when their convoy drove near a house where a wedding was under way and shots were being fired in the air in celebration, said a reporter in the town. Fourteen-year-old Sufian Daoud was shot dead and six people were wounded.
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