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FBI: Military-Grade Munitions Created Blast
Aired August 20, 2003 - 13:01 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.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: We'll start with CNN's Jane Arraf in the Iraqi capital.
Hello -- Jane.
JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF: Hello, Miles.
Well, as you mentioned, the search is going on for what exactly might have been in the cement truck that exploded. They're finding, as you said, all sorts of explosives, including mortars and a whole range of them, a recipe of things designed to have maximum impact. It's been scattered over quite a wide area, and it's been roped off by the FBI like a crime scene.
Now, they say that one of the keys will be finding the trigger mechanism. If they can find that, they may have an idea of what groups previously might have been responsible for similar types of bombings. It's not clear they will find that, nor is it clear that anyone will take responsibility for this blast. No one has so far -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Jane, a couple things. First of all, we were reporting yesterday that it was perhaps a cement mixer, a truck delivering concrete perhaps. That's being discredited now. What is the current thinking on how this bomb was delivered?
ARRAF: The current thinking is that it was a truck packed with explosives. People on the ground had said it appeared to have been a construction-type of truck that came in, and it breached security by coming in on the adjacent road. Now, around here, they have built a securing wall to prevent car bombs, but that wall didn't extend to this access road. And it was through the access road that the truck bomb came across, parked almost directly underneath the office of the U.N. special envoy and detonated.
It was obviously a well-planned attack, something where they would have had to have knowledge of where the secretary-general's office was. It was timed to explode at a time when the building was full of people, clearly something that took a lot of planning -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: And just to be clear on this, Jane, would that truck have gone through a checkpoint before it got to that location?
ARRAF: You probably can't see very well behind me because it's quite dark, but right next to this building, the former hotel that had been the U.N. headquarters for many years, there is a hospital. And it's believed to have gone past that hospital through an access road, bypassing really any formal checks.
Now, the thing about this is there are all sorts of checkpoints by U.S. soldiers around the U.S. military installations, and then casual checkpoints -- "hasty checkpoints," they call them -- thrown up in various places. There have been no U.S. checks or checkpoints or stationary soldiers around here.
So, because it came from essentially a side access road, it would not have gone through the normal security checks that one would have to do if you were driving through into this.
Also, it appears that it was a suicide bomber, which meant that he was prepared to breach any sort of security -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Precisely. Jane Arraf in Baghdad, thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
Aired August 20, 2003 - 13:01 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: We'll start with CNN's Jane Arraf in the Iraqi capital.
Hello -- Jane.
JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF: Hello, Miles.
Well, as you mentioned, the search is going on for what exactly might have been in the cement truck that exploded. They're finding, as you said, all sorts of explosives, including mortars and a whole range of them, a recipe of things designed to have maximum impact. It's been scattered over quite a wide area, and it's been roped off by the FBI like a crime scene.
Now, they say that one of the keys will be finding the trigger mechanism. If they can find that, they may have an idea of what groups previously might have been responsible for similar types of bombings. It's not clear they will find that, nor is it clear that anyone will take responsibility for this blast. No one has so far -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Jane, a couple things. First of all, we were reporting yesterday that it was perhaps a cement mixer, a truck delivering concrete perhaps. That's being discredited now. What is the current thinking on how this bomb was delivered?
ARRAF: The current thinking is that it was a truck packed with explosives. People on the ground had said it appeared to have been a construction-type of truck that came in, and it breached security by coming in on the adjacent road. Now, around here, they have built a securing wall to prevent car bombs, but that wall didn't extend to this access road. And it was through the access road that the truck bomb came across, parked almost directly underneath the office of the U.N. special envoy and detonated.
It was obviously a well-planned attack, something where they would have had to have knowledge of where the secretary-general's office was. It was timed to explode at a time when the building was full of people, clearly something that took a lot of planning -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: And just to be clear on this, Jane, would that truck have gone through a checkpoint before it got to that location?
ARRAF: You probably can't see very well behind me because it's quite dark, but right next to this building, the former hotel that had been the U.N. headquarters for many years, there is a hospital. And it's believed to have gone past that hospital through an access road, bypassing really any formal checks.
Now, the thing about this is there are all sorts of checkpoints by U.S. soldiers around the U.S. military installations, and then casual checkpoints -- "hasty checkpoints," they call them -- thrown up in various places. There have been no U.S. checks or checkpoints or stationary soldiers around here.
So, because it came from essentially a side access road, it would not have gone through the normal security checks that one would have to do if you were driving through into this.
Also, it appears that it was a suicide bomber, which meant that he was prepared to breach any sort of security -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Precisely. Jane Arraf in Baghdad, thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
