Baghdad (AsiaNews) Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said that the recent terrorist attacks are meant to slow down the process of handing over sovereignty to the Iraqis. This should happen before the end of June. Terrorists "use Islam as a cover in order to commit their criminal actions", and they are enemies of democracy and of Iraq. Allawi indicated Zarqawi and his loyalists as the people behind the attacks. Jordan terrorist Zarqawi is the AlQaeda leader in Iraq. On June 14th 12 people were killed, and 50 injured, in an explosion in Baghdad. Among them there are 2 British citizens. They were working to rehabilitate electricity. Allawi said that "five of the technicians were killed and three were seriously injured. And there have been some casualties among the Iraqis too. They were civilians who were passing by in that area. This criminal action, this cowardly action, this vicious crime targeted the heads of the infrastructure of Iraq".
Kamal al-Jarrah, a senior official at Iraq's Ministry of Education, was gunned down on Saturday. Sabri al-Bayati, a professor of telecommunications, was killed on Sunday. Many academics involved in the reconstruction of the country have become the target of terrorist attacks. Some intellectuals think many academics will leave the country. Allawi promised that security will be improved in the next few days. A special effort will be made in order to prevent "all the terrorist acts, not only Zarqawi's". According to Allawi "these crimes are not a characteristic of Muslims terrorists use Islam as a cover in order to commit their crimes".
