On 12 April 2007, the canteen of the

Council of Representatives of Iraq The Council of Representatives ( ar, مجلس النواب, Majlis an-Nuwwāb al-ʿIrāqiyy; ku, ئه‌نجومه‌نی نوێنه‌ران, ''Enjumen-e Nûnerên''), usually referred to simply as the Parliament is the unicameral legislature o ...

building was attacked by a

suicide bomber A suicide attack is any violent attack, usually entailing the attacker detonating an explosive, where the attacker has accepted their own death as a direct result of the attacking method used. Suicide attacks have occurred throughout histor ...

, killing one to eight people and wounding 23 others. The attack, in the heavily fortified

Green Zone The Green Zone ( ar, المنطقة الخضراء, translit=al-minṭaqah al-ḫaḍrā) is the most common name for the International Zone of Baghdad. It was a area in the Karkh district of central Baghdad, Iraq, that was the governmental ...

Baghdad Baghdad (; ar, بَغْدَاد , ) is the capital of Iraq and the second-largest city in the Arab world after Cairo. It is located on the Tigris near the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon and the Sassanid Persian capital of Ctesiphon ...

, occurred ten minutes after the Council of Representatives had adjourned for lunch. It was on the first floor of the Baghdad Convention Center, which houses the parliament.Suicide bomber strikes at heart of Iraqi Parliament building
''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'', 12 April 2007 Two further unexploded suicide vests were found near the canteen. The building had earlier been searched by dogs – very rare considering dogs are considered ritually unclean by Iraqis – suggesting the authorities suspected an attack was imminent. Following the attack the government closed down mobile phone networks and Apache helicopters flew overhead.

Casualties

The US military reported on 13 April that only MP

Mohammed Awad Mohammed Hussain Awad Al-Juboori () was a political party member of the Iraqi National Dialogue Council that is a moderate Sunni block. He was a representative of this block at the National Assembly of Iraq. On 12 April 2007, he was killed in th ...

had died, and that 22 others were wounded.Iraq MPs condemn parliament blast

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...

, 13 April 2007 Early reports however had said that eight people were killed, including three MPs, and at least 23 people were reported wounded. The MPs named were

, a member of the

Iraqi National Dialogue Front The Iraqi Front for National Dialogue (Arabic: الجبهة العراقية للحوار الوطني ''al-Jabha al-Iraqia li al-Hiwar al-Watani'') also known as Hiwar is a Sunni Arab-led Iraqi political party. Originally formed to contest th ...

, Taha al-Liheibi, a member of the

Iraqi Accordance Front The Iraqi Accord Front or Iraqi Accordance Front (Arabic: جبهة التوافق العراقية ''Jabhet Al-Tawafuq Al-'Iraqiyah'') also known as Tawafuq is an Iraqi Sunni political coalition created on October 26, 2005 by the Iraqi Islamic Par ...

and an unnamed Kurdish MP.

Responsibility

Suspicions initially centered on the bomber having been the bodyguard of an MP. A government spokesman said "there are some groups that work in politics during the day and do things other than politics at night". Member of Parliament Mohammed al-Dayni accused the government of lax security at the site. On 13 April, the

Islamic State of Iraq The Islamic State of Iraq (ISI; ar, دولة العراق الإسلامية '), commonly referred to as al-Qaeda in Iraq ( ar, القاعدة في العراق '), is a militant Salafist jihadist group that aimed to establish an Islamic stat ...

posted a message on an Islamist website claiming to have sent "A knight from the state of Islam ... ntothe heart of the Green Zone" to carry out the attack. It is not clear whether this claim is genuine, though some who monitor such websites believe it is. In February 2009, two bodyguards of

MP Mohammed al-Dayni were arrested on suspicion of the attacks. Alaa Khairallah Hashim, al-Dayni's security chief and Ryadh Ibrahim al-Dayni, Mohammed al-Dayni's nephew, confessed on television to involvement in several attacks, including the parliament bombing. They said the MP had given authorisation for the bomber to enter the parliament area. The security forces asked the

to lift al-Dayni's parliamentary immunity. Mohammed al-Dayni claimed that the accusations were lies and that his bodyguards had been tortured into making a false confession because he had been disclosing human rights abuses in Iraqi prisons. al-Dayni took a flight to

Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

, but the aeroplane was forced to turn back; parliament then agreed to lift his immunity.

Reactions

When the bombing occurred,

Saleh al-Mutlaq Saleh Muhammed al-Mutlaq ( ar, صالح محمد المطلك; born 1 July 1947) is an Iraqi politician who is the head of the Iraqi Front for National Dialogue, the fifth largest political list in Iraq's parliament. From 21 December 2010 to 11 ...

, the head of oppositional

, the party of the killed MP Awad, called on the United States to overthrow the government of

Nouri al-Maliki Nouri Kamil Muhammad-Hasan al-Maliki ( ar, نوري المالكي; born 20 June 1950), also known as Jawad al-Maliki (), is secretary-general of the Islamic Dawa Party and was the prime minister of Iraq from 2006 to 2014 and the vice president ...

: "We need America to realize that this pro-Iranian government it has installed has allowed interference on the side of one against the other".Suicide bomber kills Iraqi MPs
''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'', 13 April 2007. Retrieved 29 December 2014. The

Iraqi Council of Representatives The Council of Representatives ( ar, مجلس النواب, Majlis an-Nuwwāb al-ʿIrāqiyy; ku, ئه‌نجومه‌نی نوێنه‌ران, ''Enjumen-e Nûnerên''), usually referred to simply as the Parliament is the unicameral legislatur ...

held an emergency assembly the following day in response to the bombing, to "show resilience in the face of such attacks".Iraq MPs debate parliament attack

, 13 April 2007 US President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

condemned the attacks, saying "there is an enemy willing to bomb innocent people and a symbol of democracy". The

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

ian Foreign Minister,

Mohammad Ali Hosseini Mohammad-Ali Hosseini ( fa, محمد علی حسینی) was the deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordere ...

described the attack as "inhumane and satanic ... target

ing Ing, ING or ing may refer to: Art and media * '' ...ing'', a 2003 Korean film * i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group * The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game '' Metroid Prime 2: Echoes'' * "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 1992 ...

both its Shia and Sunni officials" Four days later three Ministers from the

Sadrist Movement The Sadrist Movement ( ar, التيار الصدري ') is an Iraqi Islamic national movement led by Muqtada al-Sadr. The movement draws wide support from across Iraqi society and especially from the Shi'a poor in the country. The most important ...

quit the government, citing, among other things, the growing insecurity in Baghdad.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Iraqi Parliament Bombing 2007 murders in Iraq 2007 in politics 2000s in Baghdad April 2007 crimes April 2007 events in Iraq Attacks on buildings and structures in Iraq Attacks on legislatures Council of Representatives of Iraq Suicide bombings in Iraq Terrorist incidents in Baghdad Terrorist incidents in Iraq in 2007 Building bombings in Iraq

Casualties

Responsibility

Reactions

See also

References