The attack on an agency that opposed Iraq's invasion but plunged into aiding its recovery is part of a remorseless new trend: Killing people who just want to help.

A truck laden with explosives exploded outside the United Nation's compound in Baghdad on Tuesday, killing chief U.N. representative Sergio Vieira de Mello and at least 19 other people.

"I know Serge de Mello," said Bob MacPherson, security coordinator for the relief group CARE. "The ramifications to this mission are incredible. He really was an honorable man. Brilliant. Dedicated."

The attack on a U.N. office was shocking only in its scope and high-profile locale: It may have been the worst of its kind, but it was far from unique. U.N. representatives and relief workers have become surrogates for fanatical elements of anti-Western groups from the Balkans to the Caucasus to the Middle East and beyond.

"In Congo it happens all the time. In Uganda it happens all the time. In Africa it happens, and it's tragic," said Joel Frushone, policy analyst for the U.S. Committee for Refugees. "In Somalia that happens on a daily basis. UNICEF workers are kidnapped. Grenades are thrown into compounds."

"But now that it's happened in Iraq people will be looking at it through different eyes."

Hundreds of peacekeepers, observers and other UN workers have died in the chaos of the post-Cold War era around the world, including Angola, Bosnia, Cambodia, the Congo, Chechnya, Liberia, Somalia and many others.

One of the tragedies of the attack is that it may achieve the goals of the attackers: curbing or halting the UN presence in the country. It could also demonstrate that the U.S. military itself is not capable of policing the country, thereby accelerating its withdrawal.

"I think it's endemic with the times that any internationals who are involved in humanitarian efforts are targets of violence," said MacPherson, a former U.S. Marine colonel who served in conflict areas from Vietnam to Somalia.

With the United States so far willing to take almost daily casualties, the U.N. attack could signal a shift.

"It's not hard to figure out that if you can demonstrate to the people of Iraq that this force is not able to provide security, than you are going to look for somebody else to target," MacPherson said. "As unfortunate as this is, CARE has staff in so many places around this planet that are even more insecure."

After taking only a fraction of the casualties in 1994 in Somalia that have occurred so far in Iraq, the United States pulled out of the country that quickly became a violent anarchy after it turned control of the humanitarian mission to the United Nations.

International aid groups, such as CARE, quickly followed suit, although the UN.. and other relief groups have since returned to the country.

The vast majority of international agencies often rely on local, or national staff, and they usually comprise the largest percentage of victims.

On Aug. 14, gunmen attacked a Red Crescent convoy in southeastern Afghanistan, killing two Afghan aid workers and wounding three. The Red Crescent is the Arab equivalent of the Red Cross.

The Saudi government has been cracking down on Islamic militants since May 12 suicide bombings in Riyadh killed 26 people and nine attackers. Saudi Arabia has been under pressure to crush networks that include al-Qaida, the terror group blamed for the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and the May 12 bombings in Riyadh. Fifteen of the 19 Sept. 11 hijackers were Saudis.

Relief groups began writing rules and training staff in ways to stay safe not long after five nurses for the International Committee of the Red Cross, the most determinedly neutral humanitarian organization in the world, were murdered in their sleep in the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya in 1996.

Two CARE workers were murdered in southern Sudan in 2000 and another five Red Cross employees were killed in the Congo a year later.

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