Red Cross scale back amid Iraq terror threat

The International Committee of the Red Cross today said it was scaling back the number of people working in Baghdad after receiving warnings that the organisation might be a terror target.

Nada Doumani, spokeswoman for the ICRC in Baghdad, said the organisation had gradually been cutting back the size of its staff since a Sri Lankan aid worker was killed in an attack on a convoy July 22 south of Baghdad.

She said the organisation would be keeping about 50 workers in the country, with those being pulled out leaving positions in Baghdad. She said she would be staying.

“We are concerned about the security of the staff working with us and the people who come to visit us. It seems some groups are not willing to let us work normally,” Doumani said.

“We are very upset because our services are badly needed,” she said, adding that the threat against the agency wasn’t specific but warnings that they could be a target.

Agencies in Iraq have become especially concerned with security since the suicide truck bombing on Tuesday of the UN headquarters in Baghdad in which at least 23 people were killed, including the chief UN envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello.