- BAGHDAD -- Eleven Iraqis
were killed on Wednesday and dozens more wounded in a co-ordinated suicide
bombing attack on a military base outside Baghdad.
-
- Two vehicles approached the base at Hilla, 100km south
of the Iraqi capital, early yesterday morning. The base is headquarters
of the Polish-led multinational brigade responsible for a large part of
southern Iraq.
-
- One vehicle blew up after being stopped by guards who
killed the driver. A second ploughed into barriers surrounding the base
before it also exploded.
-
- Dozens of people were injured, including 58 soldiers
from the international brigade, as the blasts destroyed surrounding houses
and buildings within the base, coalition officials said.
-
- The coalition military, now heavily protected, will take
some comfort from the fact that the bombers did not succeed in reaching
their target. But the failure increases the likelihood of further assaults
against more vulnerable targets manned by Iraqis co-operating with the
coalition.
-
- Last week more than 100 Iraqis were killed when suspected
suicide bombers attacked a police station and an army recruiting office
in Baghdad.
-
- The violence came amid continuing uncertainty about the
future of an agreement signed in November by members of Iraq's 25-member
interim governing council and the US occupation administration headed by
Paul Bremer.
-
- Doubts have risen about the third phase of the agreement
- which deals with the use of caucuses to select an interim assembly.
-
- The religious Shia grouping is still hoping for general
elections that would leave them in control of the assembly, while some
secular Iraqis are pushing for an extension of the life of a - possibly
expanded - governing council. The two Kurdish parties for their part are
concerned primarily with securing a high degree of autonomy for the areas
they control in northern Iraq.
-
- Kofi Annan, UN secretary-general, is due to issue a report
later this week on the feasibility of holding general elections before
a transfer of sovereignty by the US-led coalition due at the end of June.
Lakhdar Brahimi, the head of the UN team which visited Iraq last week,
cast doubt on the practicality of an election before that date.
-
- The issue of the status of Islam within a fundamental
law to see the country through a transitional period, which according to
the November agreement should be signed by the end of this month, has also
raised its head. However, observers put this down to the interests of the
current chairman of the council Muhssin Abdel Hamid, a conservative Sunni
Muslim.
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- © Copyright The Financial Times Ltd 2004.
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