BRIEFS

JORDANIAN FORCES STEP UP IRAQI BORDER SECURITY

Jordan has increased its security measures on the Iraqi border in order to prevent car bombs and other threatening material from entering the kingdom. These steps come after the October 9 car bombing at the Iraqi al-Qadisiyah border post, which wounded six Iraqi border police (Daily Star, October 10). According to an article in Asharq al-Awsat on October 14, the car bomb was driven by a Sudanese suicide bomber who had his hands “shackled to the steering wheel with iron chains.” As part of the new security measures, Jordanian and Iraqi security services will set up sand barriers and other prevention techniques in order to thwart future attacks on the border area and prevent the penetration of Jordanian territory. Furthermore, after the incident, Jordanian security forces searched the eastern gate of the border on the Iraqi side; they removed some 12 tons of military waste and 70 “serviceable missiles” (Asharq al-Awsat, October 14). In November 2005, al-Qaeda in Iraq sent operatives across the Jordanian border to execute coordinated suicide bomb attacks against hotel targets in Amman.