BAGHDAD, Sept 22: A suicide car bomber blew himself up near the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad on Monday, also killing a security guard and wounding 19 people, a month after a huge truck bomb devastated the building.

The bomber struck on the eve of the UN General Assembly in New York, which an Iraqi delegation is due to attend. One of Iraq’s representatives, Governing Council member Akila al-Hashemi, was critically wounded on Saturday in an assassination attempt in Baghdad.

“This is a suicide bomb,” Captain Sean Kirley, a US officer at the scene, told reporters. He said the blast happened at about 8.00am, some 250 metres from the UN building where 22 people died last month.

Capt Kirley said the bomber drove into the UN car park and was stopped by an Iraqi security guard.

The force of the blast blew the car in half and scattered shreds of metal dozens of metres. A blackened and burned-out hulk was all that remained of the vehicle.

“The driver and the guard engaged in conversation and the bomb was detonated from inside the vehicle,” Capt Kirley said. “The damage to the other cars was catastrophic.”

He said the bomber had been aiming for the UN building but was deterred by the security. “He wanted to get into the UN headquarters and he changed his target,” he said.

US military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel George Krivo told a news conference the attack was “an act of sheer brutality”.—Reuters