Suicide bombings in Iraq have more than tripled over the past year – US Official

Baghdad (alforat) The leading al Qaeda-inspired group in Syria and Iraq is tapping a “global network” of foreign fighters to carry out a surging number of suicide bombings in Iraq, the Obama administration’s top diplomat for the region said Wednesday according to a report reviewed by Alforat News Agency.

Suicide bombings have more than tripled in Iraq over the past year, from an average of seven per month in 2012 to roughly 35 per in 2013, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Brett McGurk told the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

He offered the statistics as violence rocked Baghdad Wednesday, when a wave of bombings – including one involving a suicide bomber who walked into a restaurant before detonating – killed at least 34 people near the Green Zone, the heavily fortified area where the U.S. Embassy is located.”

All of these suicide bombers, we believe, are foreign fighters recruited through extreme propaganda,” said Mr. McGurk, who added the attacks “demonstrate a sophisticated global network that is able to recruit, train and deploy human beings to commit suicide and mass murder.

“Suicide bombers, he said, are the “most precious resource” of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), arguably the region’s most vicious al Qaeda-style extremist group, whose aim is “to carve out an Islamic caliphate stretching from Baghdad to Lebanon.”

Rep. Ed Royce, California Republican and chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, said Wednesday that the Iraqi prime minister’s actions have helped fuel the growth of groups such as ISIS. “Al Qaeda,” he said, “has become very skilled at exploiting this sectarian rift and Maliki’s power grab has given them much ammunition.”