U.N. bombing may be an inside job

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- U.S. investigators suspect the bombing of the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad was an inside job and are questioning Iraqi employees and guards, many of whom were linked to Saddam Hussein's security service, a top American official said Friday.

Bernard Kerik, the former New York police commissioner who is working to re-establish an Iraqi police force, said the placement of the truck bomb and the timing of Tuesday's attack had raised suspicions.

The truck was as close as it could have been to the office of Sergio Vieira de Mello, the top United Nations envoy and one of 23 people killed in the blast. The bomb went off as a high-level official meeting was in progress in the office.

"Would the security guards have access to that information? Would the people who work in that building for any other reason have access to it? How were the schedules distributed? They're very basic parts of an investigation, and they're non-accusatory," Kerik said.

Saying that the United States would "stay the course" in Iraq, President Bush blamed the continuing violence on foreigners.

Foreign influence

"There is a foreign element moving into Iraq," Bush said, calling them "al-Qaida type fighters" who hate freedom.

Bush said his administration is working with the United Nations to help bring peace the country and he predicted that U.S. allies will send reinforcements. "There will be more foreign troops in Iraq," he said.

"Iraq is turning out to be a continuing battle in the war on terrorism," Bush said.

Also Friday, the U.S. military announced the deaths of two soldiers. One serviceman was killed in action on Thursday in Hilla, 35 miles south of Baghdad, said Spc. Margo Doers. The other died in a fire at a shooting range. The military did not say what caused the fire.

Kerik said some of the Iraqi personnel at the U.N. compound initially refused to cooperate with the bombing investigation and were being interrogated.

"There are concerns about some of the people who were working there," he said "It's all under investigation at this point."

He said the United Nations was responsible for its own security guards and he was not sure if the organization had a procedure to screen people who had worked for the former regime.

Most of the U.N. security guards at the compound had been placed there by Saddam's security service before the war and reported on U.N. staff movements at the Canal Hotel, headquarters for U.N. inspectors looking for weapons of mass destruction.

Kerik warned other non-governmental agencies to make sure their security staffs were clear of ties to the former regime.

"They were some of the most treacherous, and if we still have them running around in a capacity where they will have access to important information, then that is something we have to be concerned with," Kerik said.

Search for remains

Emergency workers continued their search for human remains in the rubble of the bombed headquarters, as 86 seriously wounded U.N. workers were being airlifted out of Iraq for medical care abroad.

Two U.N. employees were still unaccounted for and an unknown number of people -- visitors to the building -- were still buried in the rubble, he said. The U.N.'s official death toll stood at 20. However, independent checks by The Associated Press at area hospitals showed at least 23 died in the blast.

A coffin bearing Vieira de Mello's body and draped in the U.N. flag was carried aboard a Brazilian air force plane Friday following a brief, tearful ceremony at Baghdad International Airport. The plane headed for Geneva, where Vieira de Mello's wife and two children will board before flying on to his native Brazil.

Bagpipers played "Amazing Grace," and L. Paul Bremer, the top U.S. civil administrator in Iraq, wept as he consoled a sobbing U.N. employee.

The United Nations has said it won't increase the number of U.S. soldiers standing guard outside its facilities from the dozen or so it had before the attack.

Kerik said he believed the blast was a suicide bombing.

"We know that an operator drove the vehicle down the driveway, pulled alongside the wall and the vehicle was detonated," he said.

While Kerik said it was too early to say who was responsible, he said it wasn't the former Iraqi leader.

"This is absolutely, in my opinion, not coming from Saddam. This guy is traveling all around the country, probably in about three or four different locations a day. I am confident he does not have the time to sit around and plan these resistance attacks," he said.

Thursday's deaths brought the number of U.S. combat deaths in Iraq to 179, which is 32 more than in the first Gulf War.