Iraq deputy PM wounded in suicide attack
Source: Reuters
(Adds Bush paragraph 2, 12-13; Iran on detained British 9) By Waleed Ibrahim BAGHDAD, March 23 (Reuters) - Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Salam al-Zobaie, a leading Sunni Arab politician, was wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up in a hall where he was attending prayers on Friday. The second assassination bid on a senior member of the U.S.-backed government in a month came as President George W Bush rejected pressure from the Democrat-led Congress to set a date for the U.S. military to withdraw from the unpopular war. Officials said at least six members of Zobaie's entourage were killed in the attack, which was later claimed by a militant group linked to al Qaeda and which one of Zobaie's aides said was carried out by one of his own guards. "He's wounded but it's not serious," an official in Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's office told Reuters after Maliki visited Zobaie at the U.S. military hospital in Baghdad's international Green Zone. In the south, forces from neighboring Iran seized 15 British Royal Navy personnel, Britain said, triggering a diplomatic crisis and pushing oil prices above $62 a barrel to a three-month high. "This is just the kind of scenario we've worried about with all these military assets operating so close together," said John Kilduff, senior vice president for energy risk management at brokerage firm Fimat USA. Britain said the incident took place in Iraqi waters, where it routinely boards merchant vessels with U.N. permission to search them. The Foreign Office summoned Iran's ambassador and demanded the immediate, safe release of the personnel. Iran in turn summoned the British charge d'affaires in Tehran to protest over what it said was the illegal entry of British naval personnel into its water, state television said. The attack on the deputy prime minister came a day after a rocket landed yards from the prime minister's home during a news conference with the United Nations secretary general. Iraqi and U.S. security forces are engaged in a security crackdown in Baghdad aimed at stemming sectarian violence that threatens to pitch the country into civil war. In Washington, Bush threatened to veto legislation approved by the House of Representatives that would impose a Sept. 1, 2008 deadline for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq, accusing Democrats of "an act of political theater". Democrats had attached the deadline to legislation authorizing more than $124 billion in emergency funds, mostly for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this year. The narrow margin of the vote was not big enough to override a veto. TRIBAL FEUD Brigadier-General Qassim Moussawi, spokesman for security in Baghdad, told Iraqiya state television Zobaie was wounded in various parts of his body and underwent surgery. An aide to Zobaie said the deputy prime minister was hit by shrapnel in the abdomen and shoulder and that two of his brothers were among those wounded or killed. Moussawi said Zobaie was the target of two coordinated attacks -- the suicide bomber at a prayer hall in the compound of his residence and a car bomb outside. A Sunni militant group linked to al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack. Zobaie, one of two deputy prime ministers, is a member of the Accordance Front, the main Sunni Arab grouping in Iraq's Shi'ite-led national unity government. He is also a member of a well-known tribe from the Abu Ghraib area northwest of Baghdad. The aide said rival factions in the tribe were feuding, one side supporting al Qaeda militants and the other loyal to the deputy prime minister and the government. The western province of Anbar has seen a surge in violence between tribes who have come out against al Qaeda and militants who have been taking revenge on them for doing so. Insurgents have frequently targeted leaders of the U.S.- backed government. Last month, Iraq's Shi'ite vice president, Adel Abdul-Mahdi, was wounded by shrapnel when a bomb killed six people inside the Public Works Ministry. Friday's attack was not prevented by a four-hour vehicle curfew that is imposed every Friday in an attempt to stop car bombs on the Muslim holy day when people gather for prayer. Five people were killed and 20 wounded also on Friday when a car bomb exploded in the Baghdad Shi'ite stronghold of Sadr City, police said. (Additional reporting by Peter Graff and Sophie Walker in London, Aref Mohammed in Basra and Ross Colvin, Mariam Karouny and Claudia Parsons in Baghdad, and Robert Gibbons in New York)
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