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Suicide bomber strikes at heart of Iraqi Parliament building |
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Thursday, 12 April 2007 |
Violence reached the heart of the Iraqi Government today, when two MPs were killed and 10 others were wounded in a suicide attack on the canteen of the parliament building in Baghdad.
Iraqi officials and witnesses said that a suicide bomber blew himself up on the first floor of Baghdad's convention centre, which sits in the heavily-fortified Green Zone and is one of the most secure buildings in the city.
The convention centre houses the Iraqi parliamentary chamber and dozens of legislative offices, as well as the consular section of the British Embassy. No Britons were reported hurt in the blast.
Mohammed Awad, a member of the National Dialogue Front, was killed in the explosion, according to Saleh al-Mutlaq, the leader of the Sunni party. A female Sunni MP is believed to be among the injured.
Mukhlis al-Zamili, of the Shia Fadhila party, said the other MP to die was a Kurd and that six of those wounded were members of the bloc loyal to the radical Shia cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr.
"It seems that the attack was carried by a suicide attacker wearing an explosive vest," he said.
A witness told Reuters that the explosion happened the cash register in the canteen, which is on the same floor as the 275-seat parliamentary chamber. Legislators and their staff were having lunch between sessions when device went off.
"There was a big blast, I saw the fire. There were many, many wounded. Windows were shattered," said the witness, who was lightly wounded in the arm.
"The explosion took place in a cafeteria while several lawmakers were eating lunch, said Mohammed Abu Bakr, who heads the media department at the parliament. "Several people were wounded, including members of parliament and some employees."
MPs described their shock at the extraordinary breach in security.
Mohammed al-Dayni, another member of the National Dialogue Front, told Iraqi television: "I am standing now at the site of the explosion and looking at the severed legs of the person who carried out the operation. If this tells us anything, it tells us that security is lax."
The attacker would have had to bypass several checkpoints and metal detectors, both at the entrance to the Green Zone and then at the parliament building, to bring an explosive device into the convention centre. Inspections are usually so rigorous that visitors to the building have to take the battery out of their mobile phone to show that it is not dangerous.
Witnesses said that sniffer dogs had been added to the security measures this morning, a rare precaution that suggested there were fears of a terrorist attack. On April 1, US troops discovered two suicide vests inside the Green Zone.
The enormous compound, which houses most of the international interests in Baghdad, as well as the key institutions of the Iraqi Government, has suffered periodic breaches of security since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. But they have mostly been limited to explosions at the entrances and occasional rocket attacks.
Rockets killed two Americans, a soldier and a contractor, last month, a few days after another missile landed within 100 yards of where the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was holding a press conference. No one was killed or wounded in that attack.
The US Embassy said that no Americans had been reported hurt in today's explosion and that Iraqi authorities were responding.
"There was an explosion inside the Convention Centre. The cause of the explosion is unknown at this time," said a spokesman. "The status of any wounded or killed individuals is unknown at this time. Iraqi IZ (International Zone) security forces are responding to the blast."
The British Foreign Secretary, Margaret Beckett said that she was "deeply shocked and saddened to hear of this appalling attack".
"Nothing could highlight more the twisted minds of those who are seeking to disrupt the democratic process in Iraq. Those who carry out these outrageous attacks offer nothing to the Iraqi people except more murder and destruction," she said in a statement.
"The Iraqi people have shown great fortitude and courage - they deserve our full and continued support."
The explosion came shortly after a suicide truck bomb killed least ten people on a major bridge in Baghdad, wrecking the structure and sending several cars plunging into the river Tigris below.
Today's violence follows the serious fighting in Baghdad yesterday, when US and Iraqi troops were caught in the worst gunbattle since the last-ditch US-led effort to bring order to the city began in February.
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