I Cogitate

Iraqi police say children used as decoys in car bombing

The Associated Press
Wednesday, March 21, 2007

BAGHDAD: The police said Wednesday that children had been used in a weekend car bombing in which the driver gained permission to park in a busy shopping area after he pointed out that he was leaving his children in the back seat.

The account appeared to confirm one given Tuesday by a U.S. general. He said children had been used in a bombing Sunday in northern Baghdad and labeled it a brutal new tactic by insurgents to battle a five-week security crackdown in the capital.

Major General Michael Barbero, deputy director for regional operations on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the vehicle used in the attack was waved through a U.S. military checkpoint because two children were visible in the back seat. He said it was the first reported use of children in a car bombing in Baghdad.

"Children in the back seat lowered suspicion," Barbero told reporters in Washington. "We let it move through. They parked the vehicle. The adults run out and detonate it with the children in the back..."

...The reports could not be independently confirmed, and key details were missing from the police accounts...

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