Wednesday October 28, 2009

FACTBOX: Attacks Targeting U.N. staff, Sites, in 2009

REUTERS - At least six United Nations staff were killed when Taliban militants attacked an international guest house in Kabul on Wednesday.

The attack is the second against the U.N. in Afghanistan this year and the bloodiest it has suffered all year. This year's death toll for U.N. workers is now at least 17, compared to about 34 last year and 42 in 2007.

Security forces secure the area around an international guest-house in Kabul after an attack by Taliban militants October 28, 2009. (REUTERS/Ahmad Masood)

The most devestating attack took place on August 19, 2003, when 22 people, including the chief U.N. envoy to Iraq, were killed in the bombing of the main U.N. office building in Iraq.

Here is a list detailing some incidents where and when U.N. sites and staff have come under attack this year.

GAZA STRIP, Jan 6, 2009 - The shelling of civilians sheltering at U.N. schools in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip during an Israeli campaign of air strikes to stamp out Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza prompts U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to call for Israel to explain the "totally unacceptable attacks". Israel blames Hamas for fighting around U.N. sites.

QUETTA, Pakistan, Feb 2 - One U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) worker is killed, and another is reported missing, after armed men attack their vehicle as they travel to work in the Pakistani city of Quetta.

DARFUR, Sudan, March 10 - Gunmen ambush U.N. and African Union peacekeepers in western Sudan, wounding four.

The assailants open fire on the UNAMID patrol, intended to stamp out violence against cilivians, as it was returning to el-Geneina, the main town in west Darfur, close to the border with Chad.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, June 9 - A U.N. worker is among five people killed as militants use guns and a truck bomb to attack the Pearl Continental hotel in Peshawar, northwestern Pakistan. The U.N., providing relief for more than 2.5 million people displaced by fighting, withdraws all but a skeleton staff from the city.

WAJID, Somalia, Aug 16 - Suspected Islamist insurgents storm a U.N. compound overnight in southern Somalia, injuring one U.N. security guard. U.N. guards fight back and kill three attackers.

KABUL, Aug 18 - Two Afghans working for the U.N., one NATO service member and at least five Afghan civilians are killed as a suicide bomber rams an explosive-laden car into a NATO convoy.

DARFUR, Sudan, Sept 29 - One UNAMID peacekeeper is killed in an attack on a convoy carrying civilian and military personnel by armed men in El Geneina.

ISLAMABAD, Oct 5 - Five U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) staff, four Pakistanis and an Iraqi national, are killed and four others injured after a suicide bomber disguised as a paramilitary soldier walks into the WFP office after asking to use the toilet [nSP512419]. Pakistani Taliban militants claim responsibility, saying the United Nations is a U.S. slave.

DARFUR, Sudan, Oct 18 - Unidentified gunmen shoot and wound three peacekeepers, two critically, from the UNAMID mission. Two UNAMID civilian staff members, abducted from their home in a West Darfur town in August, have not yet been released, the U.N. said.

SUDAN, Oct 22 - Deputy Force Commander of the U.N. Mission in Sudan is shot to death while on leave in his homeland. The deputy commander of the nearly 9,000-strong military force, one of the UN's largest, had joined the organisation five months before.

KABUL, Oct 28 - Six U.N. staff, all foreigners, are killed during an attack on an international guest house.

Source: Reuters, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) (http://www.un.org/en/events/humanitarianday/2009/security_trends.shtml and http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=29472&Cr=Palestin&Cr1=)

(Writing by Gillian Murdoch; Editing by Ron Popeski)

News Poll

Latest Jobs from Star-Jobs

Latest from StarProperty