The story about security for the UN is not yet settled.
The US Changed the Story AGAIN about UN Attack.
Many Iraqis blame the US-led "coalition" for the UN attack: "It was the coalition's fault, because it was their job to watch the parking area where the bombing happened... but it seems they were incapable of that," said Mohammed Abdul Aziz, an Iraqi security officer working for the UN. Earlier, the Pentagon tried to claim it offered security to the UN but was turned down.
Now the story has changed again, as reported in FOX: "The U.S.-led coalition claims responsibility in the country in general but says it has no obligation to guard specific sites such as the U.N. headquarters and diplomatic missions. U.S. troops are guarding locations such as Iraqi banks and the oil ministry."
Three British Soldiers Killed in Basra
Saturday, August 23, 2003
BAGHDAD, Iraq — United Nations (search) staffers began returning to work on Saturday, even as investigators continued the grim task of searching the grounds for human remains left by Tuesday's deadly homicide bombing that killed at least 23 people, including top U.N. envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello (search).
Workers were ushered to makeshift tents, set up on the grounds of the battered Canal Hotel (search) compound in Baghdad, as debate raged over what group should have been responsible for providing security in the area of the bombing.
"It was the coalition's fault, because it was their job to watch the parking area where the bombing happened... but it seems they were incapable of that," said Mohammed Abdul Aziz, an Iraqi security officer working for the United Nations.
The U.S.-led coalition claims responsibility in the country in general but says it has no obligation to guard specific sites such as the U.N. headquarters and diplomatic missions. U.S. troops are guarding locations such as Iraqi banks and the oil ministry.
However, Maj. Mark Johnston said soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division had taken control of security at the bombed hotel, which became U.N. headquarters in Baghdad after the 1991 Gulf War.
The U.S.-led coalition has also faced mounting criticism from the Iraqi Governing Council (search) over its inability to restore electricity to prewar levels.
"They share our frustration," said L. Paul Bremer, presidential envoy to Iraq, in a briefing with the press, adding that the coalition has set an end of September deadline for restoring electricity. Bremer, who created the 25-member council as an interim government, also downplayed reports of more strife between him and the group.
He said he has asked council members to reach out to more Iraqi people, encouraging them to become involved in the reconstruction and securing of the region.
Also on Saturday, three British soldiers were killed and one seriously wounded during a guerrilla attack in the southern Iraqi port city of Basra (search). To the north, American forces reported killing two Iraqi Turkomen (search) who opened fire when the U.S. soldiers arrived to put down an ethnic clash in the city of Tuz Kharmato.
British military spokesman Capt. Hisham Halawi said the military still had no details on the attack, but termed it a guerrilla operation. Witnesses said an unknown number of men in a pickup truck shot up the British four-wheel drive vehicle in the city center.
To date, 273 U.S. soldiers have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq, according to the military.
The British government has reported 48 deaths and Denmark's military has reported one.
On or since May 1, when President Bush declared that major combat operations in Iraq had ended, 135 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq, according to the latest military figures. Counting only combat deaths, 65 Americans and 11 Britons have died since the Bush declaration.
In Tuz Kharmato, 110 miles north of Baghdad, U.S. soldiers killed two Turkomen tribesmen and wounded two others while returning fire, said Maj. Josslyn Aberle, 4th Infantry Division spokeswoman. She said the Americans came under fire as they arrived to put down an outbreak of ethnic fighting Friday.
There was unconfirmed reports that deadly clashes between the Turkomen and Kurds erupted after minority Kurds allegedly destroyed a newly reopened Turkomen Islamic shrine. The reports claimed there were five Turkomen and three Kurds killed and eleven injured in the fighting. Aberle said it was the first outbreak of ethnic conflict in the region since May.
Iraqi Turkomans are an ethnic minority with strong ties to neighboring Turkey. They live primarily in Iraq's north and northeast.
Soldiers from the 4th Infantry Division discovered a MiG 23 fighter jet, partially buried and covered with camouflage netting, and an anti-aircraft gun north of Balad, 55 miles north of Baghdad. Aberle said they also discovered a weapons cache including six mortars, three cases of mortar rounds and 25 crates of anti-aircraft ammunition.
Aberle said U.S. troops wounded two young Iraqis Friday night when they came upon a group of 17 young men loitering at a gas station after curfew in Dhuluaiyah, 40 miles north of Baghdad.
When troops arrived, the young men began to run, she said. After soldiers fired two warning shots, 15 of the group stopped, but the two who continued to run were shot in the legs. All were detained and were being questioned.
"It's still a dangerous site. We are still in the recovery stage," he said.
Iraqi employees and guards at the compound were being questioned by American authorities on the suspicion that the suicide truck bombing could have been an inside job. Many of the security guards at the hotel had been in place before the war and were linked to Saddam's security service.
Bernard Kerik, the former New York police commissioner who is working to re-establish an Iraqi police force, said the placement of the truck bomb and the timing of Tuesday's attack had raised suspicions.
The truck was as close as it could have been to the office of Vieira de Mello and the bomb went off as a high-level official meeting was in progress in the office.
"Would the security guards have access to that information? Would the people who work in that building for any other reason have access to it?" Kerik told The Associated Press on Friday.
In a tearful and brief ceremony on Friday the coffin bearing Vieira de Mello's body and draped in the U.N. flag was carried aboard a Brazilian air force plane at Baghdad International Airport. Bagpipers played "Amazing Grace," and L. Paul Bremer, the top U.S. civil administrator in Iraq, wept as he consoled a sobbing U.N. employee.
The plane stopped over in Geneva, where Vieira de Mello's wife and two children boarded the aircraft before heading for his native Brazil, airport officials in Switzerland said.
Eighty-six seriously wounded U.N. workers were being airlifted out of Iraq for medical care.
Two U.N. employees were still unaccounted for and an unknown number of people — visitors to the building — were still buried in the rubble. The U.N.'s official death toll stood at 20. However, independent checks by The Associated Press at area hospitals showed at least 23 died in the blast.
foxnews.com
Rascal @TheFirstCasualtyIsTruth.com |
