Suicide at parliament

It was only a matter of time before this happened. Today at lunch time a suicide vest was detonated in the cafe in the Iraqi parliament building. 2 or 3 MPs dead and more injured. The military found a couple of suicide vests sitting in an abandoned box in the IZ 2 weeks ago, presumably they were dropped by someone for another to come and collect them. There are rumours that a car full of explosives was found in the IZ as well but I'm not sure if that one's true. There will be more attacks like this I'm sure. It doesn't worry me too much in a personal safety kind of way as those things will always be detonated at places like the parliament or other high profile buildings. I don't tend to go those places and have never been to the parliament (though I have been next door on occasion).

What else? The 4th anniversary of the fall of Baghdad was 3 days ago and hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated against the occupation in Najaf. It must be getting harder for the UK and US politicians to insist that the continued presence of troops here is doing any good. Damned if I know - maybe in some places it is and in others it isn't. One of my staff has moved his family into the IZ because the US military set up a base in his neighbourhood and insurgents are always firing at it, so my employee was naturally worried his wife or son would be caught in the crossfire. Add to that he was injured (not seriously, to our relief) when a roadside bomb detonated on a street he was walking down with his family. I would still say that the troop surge was and is the right thing in Baghdad but it's less effective than it was and in any case, violence in other cities is in some cases off the scale.

I read today that John McCain, a probable candidate for US President next election, came to Baghdad and went on a walk around a market outside the IZ. In his media statement he bleated about how it was sign that the streets are getting safer. What he didn't mention was that he was surrounded by troops and went in a convoy of a dozen heavily armed and armoured vehicles. Dick.