August 2003

COURIER-MAIL: Life is a war zone

Former Courier-Mail reporter Michael Ware, now Time magazine's Baghdad bureau chief, finds the Iraqi capital has everything and nothing in common with Brisbane

Read More...

NPR: Explosion in Baghdad

NPR's Steve Inskeep talks with Michael Ware, reporter for Time magazine. Michael Ware is in Baghdad, and he describes the scene on the ground.

NPR: 3:12

TIME: How al-Qaeda's Ally Came Back

By MICHAEL WARE / BAGHDAD

When U.S. special forces led an assault in March on a compound in northern Iraq belonging to the militant group Ansar al-Islam, U.S. officials said they had taken out a significant terrorist threat. Before the war, Bush Administration officials identified Ansar, some of whose members are believed to have trained in al-Qaeda camps, as a link between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, a claim based on reports that Saddam had dispatched an agent to northern Iraq to establish ties with Ansar. On March 26, after the strike on the compound, Bush said the U.S. had "destroyed the base of a terrorist group in northern Iraq that sought to attack America and Europe with deadly poisons."

Read More...

TIME: Just Who is Pursuing Saddam?

By MICHAEL WARE and BRIAN BENNETT / TIKRIT

Any of the various U.S. military units stationed in Iraq would be thrilled to be part of the hunt for Saddam. And they could be at any time, should intelligence point to his presence in areas they patrol.

Read More...

NPR: Violence Continues to Hound Troops in Baghdad

NPR's Alex Chadwick talks to Time magazine correspondent Michael Ware, who describes the scene at the recent bombing of the Jordanian embassy in downtown Baghdad.

NPR: 3:16

Read More...

TIME: A Deadly Car Bomb Attack Rocks Baghdad

By MICHAEL WARE

With a roar and a rolling shockwave that shattered windows and trembled rooftops across northern Baghdad this morning the grinding guerrilla war entered a new and more lethal phase. Shortly before 11 am local time a bomb in a Coaster minivan outside the Jordanian embassy detonated with horrific force, unleashing a fireball that incinerated a car full of people passing by. Those in front of the building were killed instantly, the clothes wrenched from their bodies and flung in tufts like singed confetti, their flesh torched. More than 50 others inside the compound or in the family homes nearby were wounded.

Read More...