Eight killed in Iraq suicide attack

Baghdad, Sunday

As many as five suicide bombers killed eight people on Sunday at an Iraqi army complex, the first major attack to hit the capital since the US military declared an end to combat operations last week.

The coordinated attack occurred in the morning at the rear gate of the Rusafa Military Command headquarters in central Baghdad, which only three weeks ago was hit by a massive suicide bombing that killed dozens.

Accounts of it varied between witnesses and security force members, but the capital’s security command said five suicide attackers had approached the compound in a minibus.

“One of them stepped out of the minibus, and security forces fired at him and he exploded,” Baghdad Operations Command said in a statement.

“Two others fled to a nearby building, and the minibus exploded with the two remaining terrorists inside. Security forces cordoned off the building, and traded fire with the last two terrorists until both of them blew up.”

A health official at Baghdad’s Medical City Hospital, a short distance from the site of the attacks, said she had counted eight bodies, mostly civilians, and that 25 people had been wounded.

An interior ministry official put the toll at eight dead, including five soldiers, and 22 wounded, of whom 15 were security force members.

Gunshot wounds on both legs

“I was waiting with three of my colleagues near an armoured car (when the attack occurred),” a policeman told AFP from the hospital, slumped against the wall of the emergency room with bandages covering gunshot wounds to both of his legs.

“I was shot in two places, and I tried to hide behind the car. When I looked for my colleagues again, they were not there — all I saw was blood and the vests that they had set aside.”

The Rusafa military headquarters was being used as an army recruitment centre on August 17 when a suicide bomber detonated his payload, killing 59 people.