| Canal Hotel bombing | |
|---|---|
| Part ofIraqi insurgency (2003–2006) | |
.jpg) | |
 Interactive map of Canal Hotel bombing | |
| Location | Baghdad, Iraq |
| Date | 19 August 2003 16:28 – (GMT +3) |
| Target | United Nations headquarters |
Attack type | Truck bomb |
| Deaths | 23 |
| Injured | 100+ |
| Perpetrators | Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad[1] |
| Motive |
|
TheCanal Hotel bombing was asuicidetruck bombing inBaghdad,Iraq, during the afternoon of 19 August 2003. It killed 23 people, including theUnited Nations' Special Representative in IraqSérgio Vieira de Mello, and wounded over 100, includinghuman rights lawyer and political activistAmin Mekki Medani. The attack targeted theUnited Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq created just five days earlier.[a] The attack resulted in the withdrawal within weeks of most of the 600 UN staff members from Iraq.[4] These events were to have a profound and lasting impact on the UN's security practices globally.[5][6]
The attack was followed by a suicide car bomb attack on 22 September 2003 near U.N. headquarters in Baghdad, killing asecurity guard and wounding 19 people.[7]
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader ofterrorist organizationJama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad, in April 2004 claimed responsibility for the 19 August blast.[1]
In his bookThe Prince of the Marshes, British politician and writerRory Stewart recounts his experiences at the Canal Hotel on the day of the bombing.
I had wandered past the security point without anyone attempting to search me or ask my business. TheIraqis coming in and out of the compound were good-humored. I had said to my friend that things seemed pretty relaxed. She had replied that the special representative was proud that Iraqis could approach the UN building – unlike in theGreen Zone, whose barriers were a half mile from the main offices.
... I went to the canteen, where I sat from ten until two in the afternoon, talking to local NGO staff who came in to eat and use theInternet. I particularly liked a Tunisian security advisor who had served in theBalkans and was worried about terrorists targeting the UN.
I left at two, intending to return later in the afternoon to use the Internet. But when I came back at 4:30, a thick column of smoke was rising from either end of the building, families were screaming and pushing at a cordon ofU.S. soldiers, and the woman who had served me my salad in the cafeteria was running toward us. In my brief time away from the building, a suicide bomber had driven his truck up beneathDe Mello's office window.[8]
Theexplosion occurred while Martin Barber, director of the UN'sMine Action Service (UNMAS), was holding a press conference. The explosion damaged a spinal cord treatment center at the hospital next door and a U.S. ArmyCivil-Military Operations Centre located at the rear of the Canal Hotel, and the resulting shockwave was felt over a mile away.[citation needed]
The blast was caused by asuicide bomber driving atruck bomb. The vehicle has been identified as a large 2002 flatbedKamaz (manufactured inEastern Europe and part of the former Iraqi establishment's fleet).[9] Investigators in Iraq suspected the bomb was made from old munitions, including a single 500-pound aerial bomb, from Iraq's pre-war arsenal.[citation needed]
TheUnited Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Humanitarian Information Centre (HIC) for Iraq (UNOHCI) was located directly beneath the office ofSérgio Vieira de Mello, theUN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and suffered a direct hit. Of the eight staff and one visitor in the office at the time, seven were killed instantly, but de Mello andGil Loescher were critically wounded and trapped in debris under the collapsed portion of the building. An American soldier,First Sergeant William von Zehle, crawled down through the collapsed building and worked to extricate the two men. He was joined later by another American soldier,Staff Sergeant Andre Valentine. The two men spent the next three hours trying to extricate the two survivors without benefit of any rescue equipment. Loescher was rescued after having his crushed legs amputated by the soldiers, but Vieira de Mello died before he could be removed.[10]
According toAbu Musab al-Zarqawi, Vieira de Mello was specifically targeted in the blast. The reason given by al-Zarqawi for targeting Vieira de Mello was that he had helpedEast Timor become anindependent state (see theIndonesian occupation of East Timor). Zarqawi said that Vieira de Mello had participated in the unlawful removal of territory from the Islamiccaliphate and was therefore a thief and a criminal.[2][3]
The bombing was followed on September 22, 2003, by another car bomb outside the Canal Hotel. The blast killed the bomber and anIraqi policeman and wounded 19 others, including UN workers. The second attack led to the withdrawal of some 600 UN international staff from Baghdad, along with employees of other aid agencies. In August 2004, de Mello's replacement,Ashraf Qazi, arrived in Baghdad along with a small number of staff.[11]
| Name | Age | Nationality | Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sérgio Vieira de Mello | 55 |  Brazil | Special Representative of theUN Secretary-General to Iraq |
| Nadia Younes | 57 |  Egypt | Chief of Staff for Vieira de Mello |
| Fiona Watson | 35 |  United Kingdom | Member of Vieira de Mello's staff, political affairs officer |
| Jean-Sélim Kanaan | 33 | Egypt Italy France | Member of Vieira de Mello's staff, political officer |
| Richard Hooper | 40 |  United States | Senior advisor to the UNUnder-Secretary-General for theDepartment of Political Affairs |
| Manuel Martín-Oar | 56 |  Spain | Naval captain, assistant to the Spanish special ambassador to Iraq |
| Christopher Klein-Beekman | 32 |  Canada | UN Children's Fund's program coordinator |
| Reham Al-Farra | 29 |  Jordan | Department of Public Information, Deputy Spokesperson |
| Martha Teas | 47 | United States | UNOHCI Manager |
| Leen Assad Al-Qadi | 32 |  Iraq | UNOHCI Information Assistant |
| Ranillo Buenaventura | 47 |  Philippines | UNOHCI Secretary for Vieira de Mello |
| Reza Hosseini | 43 |  Iran | UNOHCI Humanitarian affairs officer |
| Ihsan Taha Husein | 26 | Iraq | UNOHCI Driver |
| Sati Jawad Al-Sabti | 59 | Iraq | WFP Accounts Officer |
| Basim Mahmoud Utaiwi | 40 | Iraq | UNOHCI Security guard |
| Raid Shaker Mustafa Al-Mahdawi | 32 | Iraq | United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) |
| Gillian Clark | 47 | Canada | Christian Children's Fund |
| Arthur Helton | 54 | United States | Director of peace and conflict studies at the U.S.Council on Foreign Relations |
| Alya Ahmad Souza | 54 | Iraq | World Bank |
| Khidir Saleem Sahir | Iraq | Civilian | |
| Ali Mohammed Hindi | Iraq | Civilian | |
| Saad Hermis Abona | 33 | Iraq | Working for a UNsubcontractor (Canal Hotel cafeteria worker) |
| Omar Kahtan Mohamed Al-Orfali | 34 | Iraq | Driver/interpreter,Christian Children's Fund |
| Emaad Ahmed Salman al-Jobody | 45 | Iraq | Electrician |
Marilyn Manuel, a member of Vieira de Mello's staff from the Philippines, was originally listed as missing and presumed dead in the collapsed section of the building.[12] However, she had been evacuated to an Iraqi hospital which did not notify the UN of her presence. Her survival was confirmed four days later.[13]
We destroyed the U.N. building, the protectors ofJews, the friends of the oppressors and aggressors. The U.N. has recognized the Americans as the masters of Iraq. Before that, they gavePalestine as a gift to the Jews so they can rape the land and humiliate our people. Do not forgetBosnia,Kashmir,Afghanistan andChechnya.
In an audiotape, published 6 April 2004 on a website and "probably authentic," according to theCIA,Abu Musab al-Zarqawi claimed credit for a number of attacks, including the 19 August 2003 bombing on U.N. quarters in Baghdad.[1] By December 2004,The Jamestown Foundation considered al-Zarqawi and hisJama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad responsible for the attack.[15]
In January 2005, a top bombmaker for al-Zarqawi's group,Abu Omar al-Kurdi, was captured by the coalition and claimed his associates made the bomb used in the attack. On 16 December 2005, Iraqi authorities issued anarrest warrant for Mullah Halgurd al-Khabir, a commander ofAnsar al-Sunna, in connection with the attack.[citation needed]
The Italian newspaperCorriere della Sera identified the suicide bomber as Algerian national Fahdal Nassim.[16] Other suspects includedBaathists, militantSunni andShiite groups,organized crime, and tribal elements. Blame was initially thought to lie withAnsar al-Islam, which was thought at the time to be al-Zarqawi's group. An otherwise unknown group called the "Armed Vanguards of the Second Mohammed Army" claimed they were responsible for the attack.[17]
Awraz Abd Aziz Mahmoud Sa'eed, known as al-Kurdi, confessed to helping plan the attack for al-Zarqawi. Al-Kurdi was captured by U.S. forces in 2005, judged and sentenced to death by an Iraqi court, and executed by hanging on 3 July 2007.[18]
The suicide bombing of the United Nations in Baghdad drew overwhelming condemnation.Kofi Annan, then-United Nations Secretary-General, commented that the bombing would not stop the organization's efforts to rebuild Iraq, and said: "Nothing can excuse this act of unprovoked and murderous violence against men and women who went to Iraq for one purpose only: to help the Iraqi people recover their independence and sovereignty, and to rebuild their country as fast as possible, under leaders of their own choosing."
On 11 December 2008, theUnited Nations General Assembly adopted Resolution A/63/139 on "Strengthening of the Coordination of Emergency Assistance of the United Nations," which, among other declarations, designated 19 August asWorld Humanitarian Day to recognize all humanitarian andUnited Nations and associated personnel who have worked in the promotion of the humanitarian cause and those who have lost their lives while doing so.[19]
In 2004,Gil Loescher's daughter, documentary filmmaker Margaret Loescher, made a critically acclaimed film about her father's experiences calledPulled from the Rubble.[citation needed]
Adocumentary produced in 2009 and amovie released in 2020, both titledSergio, deal with the life ofSergio Vieira de Mello and the Canal Hotel bombing.
A communiqué from al-Qaida gloated over the end of "the personal representative of America's criminal slave,Kofi Annan, the diseased Sergio de Mello, criminal Bush's friend." It went on to ask, "Why cry over a heretic? Sergio Vieira de Mello is the one who tried to embellish the image of America, the crusaders and the Jews in Lebanon and Kosovo, and now in Iraq. He is America's first man where he was nominated by Bush to be in charge of the UN after Kofi Annan, the criminal and slave of America, and he is the crusader that extracted a part of the Islamic land [East Timor].
33°20′01″N44°28′02″E / 33.33361°N 44.46722°E /33.33361; 44.46722