Baghdad/Warsaw - Poland's ambassador to Iraq escaped with his life from an apparent bomb attack Wednesday in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, while one of his bodyguards died, a Polish government official and Iraqi media reports confirmed Wednesday. The ambassador's bodyguard died in hospital after suffering serious wounds in the apparent bomb attack which occurred as Ambassador General Edward Pietrzyk was travelling in a road convoy, Polish Interior Ministry spokeswoman Patrycja Hryniewicz told Poland's TVN24 news channel.
Two other Polish bodyguards injured in the blast were in a stable condition, she said.
"There are a lot of indications that this was a direct attack on the ambassador: for instance, it occurred close to the Polish embassy," Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman Szaniawski said in Warsaw Wednesday.
But Poland's Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski told reporters in Warsaw some 900 Polish troops would not be withdrawn from Iraq over the attack.
"Deserting is always the worst solution ... any embassy in Iraq could be attacked ... regardless of whether there were Polish troops there or not," Kaczynski said.
Arab news network al-Arabiya reported that two Iraqis were also killed in the attack.
Iraq's Aswat al-Iraq news agency reported that an explosive had gone off at the roadside in the Karrada district of the capital, injuring the ambassador and several employees of the Polish embassy.
Witnesses reported seeing helicopters flying to the scene after the blast.
Six people, including three from the convoy, were wounded in the attack, Iraq's Sharqiya TV channel reported.
The Sharqiya report added that Pietrzyk, a former general, managed to leave the scene with slight injuries.
General Pietrzyk was nominated Poland's ambassador to Iraq in April of this year.
Public opposition in EU and NATO-member Poland to the presence of some 900 Polish troops in the US-led multinational forces in Iraq remains strong at 81 per cent, according to a recent survey.
