A SUICIDE bomber rammed a car packed with artillery shells into a queue of Iraqi army recruits in Baghdad yesterday, killing 35 people as violence continued to escalate before the handover of power in two weeks’ time.
Bodies were hurled into a nearby zoo after the killer, driving a sports utility vehicle, targeted the recruitment base for the Iraq Civil Defence Corps, where a bomber had slaughtered 47 Iraqis in February. More than 130 people were injured and more than a dozen vehicles were damaged, leaving broken glass and body parts strewn along the four-lane highway. The explosion was heard several miles away.
Six Iraqi soldiers were later killed and four were wounded in a second car bomb attack north of Baghdad. The Corps is the main internal security force, created by the US-led coalition to battle insurgents.
The attacks came a day after President Bush, rallying troops in Florida, asserted that “life is better” for ordinary Iraqis, and that the country was making steady progress.
Furious Iraqi survivors of the first bomb accused US commanders and their Iraqi allies of leaving them exposed to danger by forcing them to queue on the street, instead of inside the vast compound.
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The bombers clearly had intelligence that recruits who had come from all across Iraq were told to report to the centre yesterday morning.
Witnesses said that about 400 were queueing at the compound near the Muthanna airport where US troops are based.
Some of the wounded said they could no longer risk signing up for the US-trained defence corps, which has been targeted by insurgents intent on deterring Iraqis from co-operating with the coalition.
“I can’t go back. No way,” said Ibrahim Ismail, as he recovered in one hospital. “I am no longer interested in joining the army.”
Others said they had no choice. “We know this is a dangerous job but there is much unemployment,” Latif Mahmoud, 26, said.
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The US-led coalition, which will dissolve itself on June 30, has long said that Iraqi nationalists and foreign militants would target the oil industry, Iraqi government and local security forces in the run-up to the handover.
Oil exports, which the country needs to pay for reconstruction, remained paralysed yesterday after oil wells were shut down during repairs to sabotaged pipelines in the south and north. Iyad Allawi, Iraq’s Prime Minister, accused foreign states of being behind yesterday’s blast.
“Some foreign countries, through these cowardly acts, hope to affect Iraq,” he said without naming them. “I want to assure you that such attacks will not prevent Iraqis from marching towards peace and stability.”
Paul Bremer, the outgoing head of the American-led occupation authority, also blamed the attack on foreign fighters with links to al-Qaeda and gave warning of further attempts to undermine the government.
“They are the enemies of democracy, whether they are from neighbouring countries or other countries who do not want democracy in Iraq,” he said in Hillah during a day-long visit to bid farewell to Iraqi and coalition officials.
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“We’ve expected that as we moved towards sovereignty, the anti-democratic forces would step up their attacks,” he said.
Mr Bremer pledged that coalition forces would continue to help Iraqi security forces to face the threat of such attacks even after the handover of sovereignty. “You can be sure that the multinational forces will stand shoulder to shoulder with you,” he said. “We will be with you and, as your Prime Minister said, we will prevail.”
Falah Hassan al-Naqib, Iraq’s Interior Minister, said he believed that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian with strong al-Qaeda links, was behind the attack. Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, said the blast was “an attack directly at the Iraqi people”, aimed at disrupting the handover. “The terrorists used to justify their terror saying it was against the occupation. The occupation is going to end in 12 days’ time; now the terrorists appear to be trying to stop the transfer of power to the Iraqi people themselves,” he said. “We and the Iraqi people will not be deterred. The transfer of power will take place. Iraqis will take control of their lives.”
HEAVY TOLL