Attacks in Iraq will increase as the date for a US hand-over of power nears and there are fears a religious event next month could be a target, the US governor of Iraq said on Thursday.
"We will have more of a threat from terrorism as we go toward the June 30 handover because the terrorists clearly understand that once there is democracy here, there is no pretext for attacking any more," Paul Bremer said during a visit to the US Army's 82nd Airborne Division in western Iraq.
"We predicted that the situation would become more dangerous and I think it will. The terrorists clearly believe that they are on the losing end here, that time is not on their side," he told Reuters after talks with Major General Charles Swannack, the commander of the 82nd Airborne.
After a series of devastating blasts at religious ceremonies in Baghdad and Kerbala ten days ago that left more than 180 people dead, Bremer said security would have to be particularly tight at a major religious gathering next month.
He said he expected up to five million people to gather in the sacred city of "We expect that there'll be four to five million people on the streets of Kerbala at Arbain and there's no way in the world that you can search four or five million people," Bremer said.
"The attacks two weeks ago (in Kerbala) were conducted by six people wearing explosives vests - there were a million people there and you can't search a million people.
"We have to be realistic, there's no such thing as 100 percent security," he added.
To counter potential strikes, Bremer said security groups had been set up to monitor shrines in four cities - Kerbala, Najaf, Baghdad and Samarra - and were meeting weekly to share intelligence and plan policing for the event.
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