BAGHDAD, Iraq - A suicide bomber, his body wrapped in explosives and his car filled with 50 pounds of TNT, struck a police checkpoint outside U.N. headquarters in Baghdad yesterday, killing an Iraqi policeman who stopped him and wounding 19 people.
A U.S. military spokesman at the scene said the bomber, who also died in the 8:10 a.m. blast, was trying to get into the U.N. compound at the Canal Hotel, where a truck bomb a month ago killed 23 people including the top U.N. envoy to Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello. Yesterday's attack wounded two U.N. workers.
The attack, apparently timed to snarl attempts by Washington to win U.N. legitimacy for the U.S. occupation of this Arab country, could diminish the world body's willingness to become more deeply involved in Iraq's reconstruction. The United Nations already sharply reduced its work here after the Aug. 19 bombing.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan warned that if the situation continues to deteriorate, U.N. operations in Iraq will be handicapped considerably.
I am shocked and distressed by this latest attack on our premises in Baghdad
Annan said at the United Nations.
We are assessing the situation to determine what happened who did it and taking further measures to protect our installations
he said.
The blast, which could be heard across much of the Iraqi capital, took place a day before President Bush was to address the U.N. General Assembly. He was expected to offer an expanded U.N. role in rebuilding Iraq, a condition set by many nations for contributing peacekeepers and money to the reconstruction effort.
Annan has said he wants assurances of security for U.N. personnel in Baghdad along with any expanded role.
The bomber in yesterday's attack was blocked at a newly established police checkpoint on a street in back of the compound. As police inspected the bomber's car, he detonated the explosives.
Praising new security arrangements around the hotel, a U.S. military officer at the scene credited Iraqi police with preventing an even greater tragedy.
I reiterate that he was not through the checkpoint
and he was not near the U.N. compound. That means security is working
said Capt. Sean Kirley of the U.S. 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment.
The bomb exploded about 200 yards from any of the buildings or mobile offices inside the compound and about 400 yards from the hotel building itself. The truck bomb last month was parked outside the front of the hotel just yards from Vieira de Mello's office, when it exploded and brought down the facade, trapping him and several others in the rubble.
Kirley said the Iraqi police had a warning of yesterday's attack shortly before it happened. He did not give details.
The power of the blast sent the hood of the bomber's car flying 200 yards. The detached arm of a victim lay more than 100 yards away.
Iraqi police Master Sgt. Hassan al-Saadi, among the first on the scene after the explosion, said a wounded policeman told him that a gray 1995 Opel with Baghdad license plates approached the entrance to the parking area.
A guard went to search the car
opened the trunk
and the car exploded
killing him and the driver. When I arrived
there was fire and smoke
even the guard's body was ablaze
