Coalition HQ targeted in rocket attack
One person was wounded when at least 10 rockets detonated in central Baghdad, near an area that houses the headquarters of the US-led coalition.
Sirens blared for several minutes last night and smoke and flames were briefly visible on the skyline, but there were no reports of casualties.
Iraqi police and witnesses said the Katyusha rockets were fired in the direction of the Baghdad Convention Centre, a major coalition building, and the al-Rasheed Hotel, where many coalition staff members stay. A short time later, the vehicle from which the rockets were fired exploded.
The vehicle, a white Toyota Land Cruiser, was parked near the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The building was partly renovated after being looted and set ablaze in the lawlessness that engulfed Baghdad following the fall of the capital April 9.
The rockets struck on the northern edge of the Green Zone, which houses the coalition headquarters. A US civilian contractor was wounded, the military said.
Inside the Green Zone, employees at the Baghdad Convention Centre, where the US military press office is based, fled into the basement, said Army 1st Sergeant Stephen Valley, a military spokesman.
“Everyone’s OK. Everyone’s been accounted for,” Sgt Valley said. “They’re all down in the basement.”
Shortly after the blasts, a US Army OH-58 Kiowa helicopter, a surveillance aircraft, and an Apache helicopter flew low over the nearby Tigris River, possibly in an attempt to seek out the heat signature of the rocket launchers. The helicopters use infrared sights to seek out the heat left by the rocket tubes.
Iraqi police immediately sealed off the street where the car was located and US armoured vehicles rushed out of the Green Zone, possibly in search of suspects. US troops also patrolled on foot in the area immediately beyond the police security cordon. Security was beefed up at the nearby “Assassins Gate”, one of the main Green Zone entrances, with a Bradley fighting vehicle blocking the gate.
The blasts came as Shiite politicians who had delayed the signing of Iraq’s interim constitution said they will sign the document without any changes today.
Five Shiite members of the Iraqi Governing Council met Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani at his home in the holy city of Najaf to discuss how to resolve the impasse over the constitution.
The five had refused to sign the constitution on Friday because of al-Sistani’s objections – angering other members, some of whom saw the move as a Shiite attempt to grab more power. Sunni and Kurd council members refused to change the charter.
After the Najaf talks, it appeared the Shiites were backing down in their refusal.
“Sistani has reservations, but it will not constitute an obstacle,” said Mohammed Hussein Bahr al-Ulloum, who helped co-ordinate the talks on behalf of his father, council president Mohammed Bahr al-Ulloum.
“It will be signed as it was agreed upon before by the Governing Council members,” the son said.
The approval of an interim constitution is a key step in the US-backed plan to hand over power to the Iraqis on June 30. The document will remain in effect until the end of 2005 after a permanent charter is approved.
The Shiite politicians said they were optimistic that the constitution will be signed today.
“The news is very good and we are going to sign it on Monday,” council member Mouwafak al-Rubaie said yesterday. “We are glad that the grand ayatollah understood our position.”
The council was to meet this morning to discuss the results of the talks with al-Sistani. Salem Chalabi – a top adviser in the Iraqi National Congress, a political party whose leader refused to sign on Friday – said he was confident the interim constitution would be signed on the same day.
The main dispute was over a clause in the interim charter that would have given Iraq’s Kurds the power to scuttle a permanent constitution when it comes up for a referendum in late 2005.
The clause says that even if a majority of Iraqis support the permanent charter, the referendum would fail if two-thirds of the voters in three provinces reject it.
The Kurds control three provinces in the north, enabling them to stop any constitution that encroaches on their self-rule region. Al-Sistani objected to a minority having the power to block any charter approved by the Shiite majority.
A Kurdish official said his side would not consent to changing the clause, which was agreed to by the entire council when it approved the constitution last week after several days of intense debate.
“We are sticking to it because it’s a legitimate demand,” said Kosrat Rasul, an official in the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of two main Kurdish parties on the council.
Some Shiite leaders also said they wanted to change a clause that would have provided for a single president with two deputies. The Shiites were reviving their demand for a presidency that would rotate among three Shiites, a Kurd and a Sunni – giving the Shiites a dominant role. US and some Iraqi officials, however, said the shape of the presidency was not in dispute.
Al-Sistani has twice before derailed US plans with objections to the timetable and methods for transferring sovereignty to an Iraqi government. The Bush administration wants to carry out the transfer well before US presidential elections in November.
