Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Live Saturday
Anti-American Sentiments Among Iraqis Fueled by Explosion in Baghdad
Aired April 26, 2003 - 13:03 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN ANCHOR: Anti-American sentiment among Iraqis is being fueled today by an explosion at an ammunition dump in Baghdad. U.S. Central Command says six Iraqis were killed. Residents say at least 14 died.
CNN's Jim Clancy is in Baghdad with the latest. Jim, CENTCOM is telling us that the weapons cache, where this explosion occurred, was something that the regime had put together. Do we have any idea whether or not the explosion was intentional, or did it happen by accident?
JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we have an idea that it was intentional, but it was sabotage according to the U.S. military. Intentional in that someone, according to the U.S. military, fired an incendiary device into this massive ammunition dump.
Now, it was a dump that, according to CENTCOM, had already been there. Iraqis in the area and some U.S. soldiers told that us other arms and munitions had been taken there from schools or from apartments, places where the regime had stored them for safekeeping in order to keep them out of the hands of militants or to keep them simply from falling into the hands of children.
The scene, the result of that explosion today, though, devastating. What appeared something on the order a FROG-7 missile went skyward in the fire. Several of them had gone up, this one landing in the midst of a residential neighborhood. It bored a deep hole into the ground. A crater there destroying, flattening two homes.
Both the U.S. military and the Red Cross say six people were killed, 50 others were wounded in all of this. The hospital's treating many of those wounded, some of them suffering from burns. U.S. military people getting involved in treating the wounded that we saw on the scene.
The crowd at the scene was very angry at the United States and blaming them, although, members of U.S. 101st Airborne had come there and actually helped them to clear away some of the rubble to recover anyone. What they were getting out, though, were dead bodies unfortunately.
It was only about an hour and a half, two hours later, that hundreds of demonstrators converged on the international press center that is a hotel in the center of the city, there to vent their rage against the United States. Only two or three days before, they say, they had gone to the U.S. Military and asked them to move the arms. The military's response was that it was safe where it was, safer than trying to transport them on roads.
In any event, a tragedy this night, this day in Baghdad. And another casualty is once again U.S. credibility -- Andrea.
KOPPEL: And certainly another example of just how dangerous Baghdad still is. Jim Clancy, thank you very much, joining us there from Baghdad.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
in Baghdad>
Aired April 26, 2003 - 13:03 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN ANCHOR: Anti-American sentiment among Iraqis is being fueled today by an explosion at an ammunition dump in Baghdad. U.S. Central Command says six Iraqis were killed. Residents say at least 14 died.
CNN's Jim Clancy is in Baghdad with the latest. Jim, CENTCOM is telling us that the weapons cache, where this explosion occurred, was something that the regime had put together. Do we have any idea whether or not the explosion was intentional, or did it happen by accident?
JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we have an idea that it was intentional, but it was sabotage according to the U.S. military. Intentional in that someone, according to the U.S. military, fired an incendiary device into this massive ammunition dump.
Now, it was a dump that, according to CENTCOM, had already been there. Iraqis in the area and some U.S. soldiers told that us other arms and munitions had been taken there from schools or from apartments, places where the regime had stored them for safekeeping in order to keep them out of the hands of militants or to keep them simply from falling into the hands of children.
The scene, the result of that explosion today, though, devastating. What appeared something on the order a FROG-7 missile went skyward in the fire. Several of them had gone up, this one landing in the midst of a residential neighborhood. It bored a deep hole into the ground. A crater there destroying, flattening two homes.
Both the U.S. military and the Red Cross say six people were killed, 50 others were wounded in all of this. The hospital's treating many of those wounded, some of them suffering from burns. U.S. military people getting involved in treating the wounded that we saw on the scene.
The crowd at the scene was very angry at the United States and blaming them, although, members of U.S. 101st Airborne had come there and actually helped them to clear away some of the rubble to recover anyone. What they were getting out, though, were dead bodies unfortunately.
It was only about an hour and a half, two hours later, that hundreds of demonstrators converged on the international press center that is a hotel in the center of the city, there to vent their rage against the United States. Only two or three days before, they say, they had gone to the U.S. Military and asked them to move the arms. The military's response was that it was safe where it was, safer than trying to transport them on roads.
In any event, a tragedy this night, this day in Baghdad. And another casualty is once again U.S. credibility -- Andrea.
KOPPEL: And certainly another example of just how dangerous Baghdad still is. Jim Clancy, thank you very much, joining us there from Baghdad.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
in Baghdad>
