Baghdad Suicide Car Bombs Kill More Than 150, Wound Hundreds
Oct. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Twin suicide car bombs targetinggovernment buildings in central Baghdad killed more than 150people and wounded hundreds in one of the deadliest attacks inrecent years, the state-run Iraqi news agency said.
The explosions went off at 10:30 a.m. local time yesterdayoutside the headquarters of the Baghdad provincialadministration and the Ministry of Justice, about 500 metersapart, the Iraqi National Agency said, citing unidentifiedofficials.
A pall of smoke rose up from the scene of the attack indowntown Baghdad, which caused extensive damage to thesurrounding buildings. Rescue workers dug through the rubble forbodies, with the death toll climbing throughout the day.
“This can only be considered as a serious shortcoming bythe Iraqi security forces, which allowed such an attack tohappen twice in a short space of time in the heart of the Iraqigovernment,” Alex Vatanka, senior Middle East analyst atEnglewood, Colorado-based IHS Jane’s, a defense research group,said in a telephone interview.
The bombings were the second since August to targetgovernment buildings in the Iraqi capital. Coordinatedexplosions in Baghdad on Aug. 19 struck sites including theForeign Ministry, killing almost 100 people. Iraq has suffered asurge in violence this year focused on government offices,security forces, the majority Muslim Shiite population and theKurdish-dominated northern cities of Mosul and Kirkuk.
Fragile Security
The attacks, blamed by the government on al-Qaeda andinsurgent groups, underscore the fragility of security sinceU.S. troops withdrew from urban areas on June 30 and as thecountry prepares for elections in January. U.S. President BarackObama aims to remove all combat forces by the end of August 2010and wants a complete U.S. withdrawal by the end of 2011.
“This is horrible news for Obama, who wants to have lessimportance for Iraq in foreign policy and focus more onAfghanistan,” Vatanka said. “Iraq is reappearing as asignificant factor, complicating hugely his entire foreignpolicy.”
The bombings “outrageous” and “serve no purpose otherthan the murder of innocent men, women and children,” Obamasaid in a statement e-mailed to reporters from the White House.Obama spoke with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and PrimeMinister Nuri al-Maliki yesterday, expressing his condolencesand reiterating the U.S. commitment “to stand with Iraqis,”the statement said.
Fragile, Reversible Progress
The bombings showed “that the progress in Iraq, thoughsignificant, remains fragile and reversible,” General DavidPetraeus, head of U.S. Central Command, said in an e-mail toBloomberg News.
“Despite all that has been achieved by Iraqi and CoalitionForces, there still are extremists who want to re-ignite thecycle of sectarian violence that did such enormous damage toIraq in 2006 and 2007,” Petraeus wrote. “We must sustain ourefforts, with our increasingly capable Iraqi partners, toprevent that.”
Senator John McCain of Arizona said the attacks won’t causethe U.S. to rethink its troop drawdown strategy, speakingyesterday on the CBS program “Face the Nation.”
“There will continue to be outbreaks of this violence --it’s extremists trying to ignite sectarian violence, that’swhat’s going on,” McCain said. “We’ve still got a ways to gobut it’s not going to require any delay in withdrawal of U.S.troops.”
The attacks will continue “but they are not sustainable,”said McCain, ranking Republican on the Senate Armed ServicesCommittee. “The Iraqi military will be able to handle thistransition” as U.S. troops continue to be reduced from thecurrent level of about 117,000, he said.
Precarious Time
While violence is below levels at the height of sectarianconflict between Shiites and minority Sunni Muslims three yearsago, it has undermined Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki.
“This is coming at a precarious time because of theupcoming elections and the rather quickly paced U.S. withdrawalnext year,” Peter Harling, an Iraq expert at the Brussels-basedInternational Crisis Group, said by phone from Damascus.“Maliki opponents in the elections have an interest in seeinghim fail in his reputation as someone who has brought a degreeof stability. The insurgents are keen to show they have theability to destabilize Iraq.”
U.S. and Iraqi commanders have said they expect violence toincrease before the national elections in January. Apart fromthe August bombings, the single previous worst incident thisyear in Iraq was on June 24, when 69 people died following ablast in a market in Baghdad’s Shiite Sadr City area.
-- With assistance from Daniel Williams in Cairo and TonyCapaccio in Washington. Editors: Ann Hughey, Gregory Mott.
To contact the reporter on this story:Henry Meyer in Dubai at hmeyer4@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: October 25, 2009 17:18 EDTSource: Bloomberg
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