Baghdad Car Bomb Blast Kills at Least Six
Sun October 12, 2003 09:30 AM ET
By Brian Williams and Michael Georgy
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A suicide bomber killed at least six Iraqis and injured at least 20 outside a Baghdad hotel used by U.S. officials Sunday, the latest in a string of such attacks on Western targets.
"I saw limbs and pieces of flesh everywhere," security guard Kahin Hussein said after the bomber crashed a car through a concrete security barrier protecting the Baghdad Hotel.
The hotel is widely thought to be used by members of the CIA, officials of the U.S.-led coalition, their Iraqi partners in the Governing Council and U.S. contractors.
"A man crashed his car through the security barrier of the Baghdad Hotel and ignited it. There are at least six fatalities," U.S. military spokesman Col. Peter Mansoor said.
Medics treated 19 people -- security guards, police and civilians -- at a nearby hospital and Mansoor said one American soldier was also slightly injured.
The bombing deals a further blow to President Bush as he seeks to bolster support for his Iraq policies. The United States blames such attacks on guerrillas resisting the U.S.-led occupation.
"Iraq has just become a place of death, hatred and explosions," said witness Safa Adil, who said he saw people diving to the ground and dying around him as the blast struck.
Hotel employees said five or six bodies lay in the hotel courtyard.
An Iraqi eyewitness said he saw a white car crash through the security barrier. "I saw a car coming toward the hotel. One of the guards opened fire and it exploded," Nael Murkos said.
GUESTS LEAVING WITH SUITCASES
U.S. helicopters circled overhead minutes after the blast, while ambulances, fire engines and dozens of Iraqi policemen rushed to the scene. Guests were seen leaving the hotel carrying suitcases.
Earlier Sunday, a roadside bomb struck a convoy of three civilian vehicles in central Baghdad, injuring five Iraqis, including a Shi'ite cleric, witnesses said.
U.S. forces sealed off the area. A crowd gathered at the scene and an Iraqi teen-ager threw an explosive at a U.S. Humvee armored vehicle, slightly injuring one U.S. soldier. "It was a plastic bomb thrown by a boy," a U.S. officer told Reuters.
Another roadside bomb exploded outside a U.S. base in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit Sunday, wounding three soldiers, one seriously, an Army spokesman said.
The explosives were detonated outside a gate at the headquarters for Task Force Ironhorse as two U.S. Humvee vehicles were passing, said First Lieutenant Don Calderwood, a spokesman for the 1st Brigade, 22nd Infantry Battalion.
Facing doubts at home, and tumbling poll ratings, over the daily attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq and the proposed $87 billion cost of rebuilding the country, the Bush administration is waging a public relations campaign aimed at highlighting postwar successes. Saturday it hailed the launch of the country's new currency as a sign of economic promise.
Attacks on occupying troops in Iraq have killed 94 soldiers since Washington declared major combat over on May 1. A military spokesman said there had been 28 attacks in the 24 hours to Saturday afternoon, wounding 11 soldiers. He said the usual daily number of attacks was around 12 to 20.
Washington is pushing for a new Security Council resolution giving the United Nations a broader mandate to try to persuade reluctant countries to help in stabilizing Iraq.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan has said the United Nations cannot play a political role in Iraq under the terms envisaged in the current draft U.S. resolution. France and Russia have also criticized the draft, saying it should include a roadmap for a faster handover of power to a sovereign Iraqi government.
Annan has agonized over staff safety in Iraq since an Aug. 19 suicide bomb attack on the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad killed 22 people and a second bomb attack on the compound last month killed an Iraqi policeman and wounded 19.
In Baghdad, the president of the U.S.-appointed Governing Council said Saturday it was still in dispute with Washington over plans to deploy thousands of Turkish troops in Iraq.
Turkey's parliament voted Tuesday to send soldiers to help police Iraq, but members of the Governing Council say they reject the presence of troops from any neighboring countries. |
