Baghdad hotel bombed, 1 dead

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- A bomb exploded outside a Baghdad hotel housing NBC staff, killing a guard and injuring a Canadian sound engineer. Earlier Thursday, Aquila al-Hashimi, one of three women on Iraq's U.S.-picked Governing Council, died, five days after she was shot by gunmen.\nThe bomb was placed about three feet from the wall of the al-Aike Hotel in south-central Baghdad in a hut that housed the hotel's generator, Iraqi police said. It killed the Somali night watchman as he slept.\nLt. Col. Salman Kareem said the damage to the hotel was minimal, involving mainly broken glass.\nNo group immediately claimed responsibility for the blast. NBC correspondent Jim Avila said there were no signs on the hotel indicating the television network had quarters there.\nA dozen NBC staffers were inside the building when the explosion occurred, and a Canadian soundman, David Moodie, was slightly injured by flying glass.\n"I was awake," Moodie said. "A chest of drawers in the room fell on me. I sleep in the room immediately above the generator, so I guess I was lucky."\nMoodie said he suffered one deep cut from flying glass and would require stitches. He said no other NBC employees were hurt.\nLater, Gary Thatcher, the U.S.-led coalition's director of strategic communications, said al-Hashimi died about 11:30 a.m.\nShe was ambushed and shot in the abdomen by six men in a pickup truck while driving near her home in western Baghdad Saturday as she prepared to attend the United Nations General Assembly, which opened in New York on Tuesday.\nAl-Hashimi will be buried Friday, and the Governing Council announced a three-day mourning period beginning Thursday.\nIn a statement, the council said al-Hashimi "fell as a martyr on the path of freedom and democracy to build this great nation. She died at the hands of a clique of infidels and cunning people who only know darkness."\nThe Council said her death would not distract it from rebuilding Iraq.\nL. Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator for Iraq who currently is in Washington, issued a statement of condolences.\n"Today, the people of Iraq have lost a courageous champion and pioneer for the cause of freedom and democracy. On behalf of the Coalition Provisional Authority and all its members, I offer my heartfelt condolences to her family, her colleagues at the Governing Council and the people of Iraq," Bremer said.\nAl-Hashimi, who was not married and thought to have been in her mid-40s, had been cared for a U.S. military hospital in the compound at Saddam Hussein's former Republican Palace in central Baghdad where the U.S.-led coalition has its headquarters.\nAl-Hashimi, a career diplomat and Shiite Muslim, had been expected to become Iraq's new ambassador to the United Nations. She served in the Foreign Ministry during the Saddam government and was the only official of the ousted regime appointed to the 25-member Governing Council.\nThe Governing Council president, Ahmad Chalabi, blamed remnants of the Saddam regime, ousted by U.S.-led forces in April.\nChalabi attended the Security Council along with Adnan Pachachi, the elder statesman on the council and a former foreign minister in a government before Saddam Hussein seized power.\nAl-Hashimi was a controversial choice for the council. She has served as a key aide to former Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz and often traveled abroad with him as he represented Saddam's government.\nAl-Hashimi ran the oil-for-food program in the Foreign Ministry under which the United Nations allowed Iraq to exchange oil earnings for humanitarian goods.\nShe had a degree in law and a doctorate in French literature and viewed herself as a women's rights advocate. Her last role at the ministry was as director of international relations.\nU.S.-led forces have been struggling to put down a guerrilla-style insurgency that has targeted Americans and their Iraqi allies. The police chief of the central town of Khaldiyah, who was working with U.S. forces, was assassinated by gunmen last week, and other attacks have killed police recruits trained by the Americans.\nLast month, Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, a top Shiite cleric who leads a movement with a seat on the Governing Council, was killed in a car bombing that left at least 85 people dead. Al-Hakim's brother, Abdel-Aziz, is a council member.\nThe council was established by the U.S.-led coalition in mid-July to put an Iraqi face on the process of rebuilding the country.