8 Iraqis, US soldier, Spanish Diplomat Killed in Iraq Attack

[Emillereid]

VOA News
09 Oct 2003, 11:46 UTC

 
Three separate attacks in Iraq have left eight Iraqis, one U.S. soldier and a Spanish diplomat dead.

A suicide bombing at a police station in a Shi'ite neighborhood of Baghdad killed three Iraqi policemen and five civilians. Police say a car sped through the gate of the compound in the Sadr City section of the city and exploded as policemen were lining up for a morning role call. Some 20 other people were reported wounded in that attack.

North of the capital, the U.S. military says a soldier was killed when a military convoy he was traveling in was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade near the town of Baquba.

And Spain's Foreign Ministry in Madrid says one of its diplomats in Baghdad was assassinated as he left his home in the city early Thursday. The diplomat was identified as an information attache, named Jose Antonio Bernal. ...

http://www.voanews.com/article.cfm?objectID=4D9BA546-C0A1-411C-89BA95384AC77361

It's not safe to be a policeman in Iraq, that's for sure.

[mistertrickster]

1. But there's no resistance in the South or North--just listen to

Sec'ry Rumfilled . . .

[Barrett808]

2. Spanish agent is assassinated in his underwear

Suicide bomber kills eight, then Spanish agent is assassinated
By Elizabeth Nash and Andrew Buncombe
10 October 2003

Gunmen shot dead a Spanish intelligence agent in Iraq yesterday as he fled from his home in Baghdad in bare feet and underpants.

...

Jose Antonio Bernal was a military attaché to Spain's embassy in Iraq and a member of Spain's intelligence agency, the National Intelligence Centre.

At least three men pulled up outside his house in a brown Opel early yesterday morning, and a man dressed in the black turban of a Shia Muslim knocked on Sergeant Bernal's front door. The diplomat opened the door himself, in his underwear, and "pushed past the cleric and ran down the street to the left" according to a mechanic who saw what happened.

A school security guard on the same street said the men had drawn pistols and chased Sgt Bernal for nearly 50 yards. "They chased him down the road firing their pistols at him all the time. One bullet struck him in the neck and he collapsed and died on the street. The three men jumped back into the car and sped away," the guard said.

Sgt Bernal, 34, had lived in Baghdad for more than two years - one of two Spanish diplomats who had remained in post throughout the war. He was married with a young daughter but his family had returned to Spain some months ago.

"This was the first terrorist act against a Spanish citizen," said Ramon Gil-Casares, Spain's Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs after the attack. "We don't know why he opened the door, whether it was because he knew some of them. He was a professional in security matters, and we don't know why he opened the door with that kind of training". The separate bomb attack took place in the Shia slum known as Sadr City - formerly Saddam City - in the north-east of Baghdad and was carried out as about 50 police officers had gathered outside the compound to collect their pay.

(more)

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=451738

[Guaranteed]

3. Dammit...

they're using that word "terrorism" wrong all the time now. The guy was an intelligence agent. It was an assassination, not terrorism. Terrorism is indiscriminate killing of innocent and defenseless civilians for the purpose of TERRORIZING them.
It's like the bombing of the Cole, which many people mistakenly call a terrorist act. It was a legitimate, military target. It WAS meant to terrorize and make a point, but it was a military target. They're fair game.