Girl’s death highlights need to defeat Isis: Bishop
The death of an Australian girl in a Baghdad bombing underscored why Australia was fighting Isis ( Islamic State) militants in the Middle East, the Australian Foreign Minister said yesterday.
Zynab Al-Harbiya, 12, from Melbourne, went with her family to Baghdad to visit her sick grandfather but was among the 17 people killed on Tuesday when a car bomb exploded outside a popular icecream shop, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said.
Isis claimed responsibility for the attack, which Iraqi officials said involved apparently remotely detonated explosives inside a parked car.
“This tragedy underscores the brutality of this terrorist organisation. It shows no respect for religion, nationality, sovereignty, borders, no respect for humanity,” Bishop told reporters.
“This is why the Australian Government has continued to commit our defence personnel to support the Iraqi security forces, so that they can fight to defeat this terrorist organisation within Iraq and to prevent its spread to other parts of the world including in our region,” she added.
The girl’s cousin, Layla Al-Saabary, told ABC that Zynab’s mother and uncles were among the dozens injured. Her cousin did not say how many uncles.
“She wanted to go and buy icecream, so she insisted,” Al-Saabary said.
“Her mother gave permission and so they went to the main square and she was going to go buy icecream and she went and she never came back.”
The family had only been in Baghdad for a few days when the tragedy occurred and Zynab had been “scared of the bombs”, her cousin said.
Australia is one of the biggest contributors to the US-led military campaign against Isis militants in Iraq and Syria, with 780 Australian military personnel in the Middle East and aircraft including six jet fighters striking Isis targets.
Ramadan is often marked by an increase in violence in Iraq.
Last year, a huge truck bombing claimed by Isis killed hundreds in a retail district in central Baghdad where people were shopping for clothes ahead of the holiday that marks the end of Ramadan. It was the single deadliest event in Baghdad since Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003.