Trying To Blast The Elections Away: Muslim Terrorists ( The Only Kind Of Terrorists, These Days) Kill 127 In Coordinated Baghdad Bombings

Dec 8, 2009 1 Comment ›› Pat Dollard

Times Online:

A blue van charged through a checkpoint in western Baghdad just after 10am, ran over a security guard while his colleague fired at the windscreen, and raced through an alley of concrete blast walls

It then ploughed through a second barrier, crashing into the parking lot of the al-Karkh courthouse and exploding on impact.

This was one of five near simultaneous car bombs that destroyed official buildings across the city today, killing at least 121 people and injuring more than 500 in the most co-ordinated attack in the Iraqi capital in recent years.

The bombings were timed to coincide with the announcement of the date of the next parliamentary elections, in March. No terror group has so far claimed responsibility but the most likely culprits are Sunni extremists variously called Baathists, Saddamists and al-Qaeda in Iraq.

Overall violence has dropped sharply in the last two years, with the lowest death toll since 2003 recorded last month. But insurgents have managed to stage spectacular attacks regularly – one on August 19 and another on October 25 killed a total of more than 250 people at four government ministries.

Today’s bombs targeted buildings belonging to the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Finance (already hit once in August), a law academy, a district of southern Baghdad that houses a large oil refinery, and the al-Karkh courthouse, which hears about half of all civil and criminal cases in the capital.

In its parking lot, law graduates were queueing to apply for jobs as clerks. When they heard shooting they hid behind a rusty generator fearing the worst, but nothing could protect them from the force of the bomb that levelled parts of the main building and brought its roof down, crushing dozens of people in courtrooms on the top floor.

Ahmed Jowad, a warehouse worker who was inside at the time, said: “The glass and windows were blown in as we ducked under the tables because of the shooting but then we were thrown across the room. We couldn’t get out because there was a fire. Smoke and dust everywhere. Later I saw all the dead bodies in the yard, the young lawyers. I heard screaming and helped people crawl out of the building.”

For Mr Jowad, an employee of the Justice Ministry, this was his second major explosion in six weeks. He was at the main ministry building when it was attacked on October 25, after which his place of work was moved to the courthouse. “They are following me around,” he said of the attackers, tending to scratches on his face from flying glass.

In the aftermath of the attack, concrete ceilings and enforced walls lay folded on the floor like pieces of discarded paper. A concrete block the size of a tennis court rested on top of a row of burnt-out cars. Broken glass was scattered in puddles of fresh blood, hastily covered with leaves from a tree shorn of its foliage by the blast

The three-storey courthouse lost its facade and its roof as well as much of the protective concrete wall that had surrounded it until a few hours earlier. Rooms on the ground floor were filled with bricks from walls that had crumbled higher up.

Parts of the blackened chassis of what is likely to have been the bomber’s van were embedded in the generator behind which the young lawyers had sought refuge, 150ft from the blast crater, which itself had been filled with rubble from the collapsing building almost as soon as it had been created.

Surveying the destruction, Colonel Ahmed Khalifa of the Iraqi Army 6th Division that is stationed nearby, said: “The guards at the gate should have stopped the van coming through. It’s clearly negligence and laziness at fault.”

Hours after the explosion, corpses were still being taken away in black body bags by civil defence workers. They had to climb over dozens of burnt-out cars, some of whose petrol tanks had ignited in secondary explosions triggered by the bomb.

A member of the Baghdad provincial council, who was visiting the site, said: “This is a campaign of losers. They see the progress the Government is making and they try to show people that there is still no security. They are creating obstacles for the coming elections. These are criminals with blood on their hands.”

The elections are to be held on March 7.

The attacks overwhelmed Baghdad’s security forces, prompting them to call American troops for help. They handled previous attacks almost on their own, but yesterday groups of US soldiers not only helped the Iraqis with forensic work but also cordoned off sections of the city and diverted traffic. Under an agreement between Baghdad and Washington, Iraqi security forces took over responsibility for urban areas in the summer.

The member of the Baghdad provincial council said: “The Americans are friends and in difficult situations they come to help us.”