The United Nations decided on Tuesday to allow an independent inquiry into the deadly bombing of the U.N. compound in Baghdad following complaints the world body should not just investigate itself.

Catherine Bertini, the undersecretary-general for management, sent an e-mail to all U.N. staff saying that in addition to a U.N. investigation "an independent inquiry will be conducted to investigate our security arrangements in the run-up to the bombing" that killed 22 people and injured 160.

Bertini, in her e-mail, did not give details of what independent body may undertake the additional security analysis of the Aug. 19 bombing.

Since the attack, the U.N. Staff Union's committee on security has called on Secretary-General Kofi Annan to suspend U.N. operations in Iraq and conduct a "full and independent investigation to determine why adequate security was not in place at U.N. headquarters in Baghdad."

The union asked why so many U.N. staff were in Baghdad despite a "phase four" security status under which all but essential staff should be withdrawn, although U.N. sources said security personnel had some leeway to make such decisions.

The U.N. security coordinator, Tun Myat, who has just returned from Iraq, was expected to make a report in a few days that may not be released.

Some security experts said little could have been done to prevent the truck bomb that ripped through the world body's Baghdad offices, killing 22 people, including the head of the mission, Sergio Vieira de Mello of Brazil, and his chief of staff, Nadia Younes of Egypt.

TOO LITTLE TOO LATE?

Basic question remain unanswered. Did the United States, responsible for security of the U.N. headquarters, do too little too late? Did the United Nations, whose officials did not want to be locked in an armed camp, reject U.S. offers?

"We were never able to confirm that on any occasion the U.N. refused an offer of security," said U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard. "We did say that we did not want to live in an armed camp, and we are currently reassessing security since we became vulnerable to this violent attack."

Eckhard recalled that at the time of the explosion, the United States was putting up a 12-foot concrete wall in response to an increased security threat "that they perceived and we acknowledged."

"It was not enough to prevent the damage from this bomb attack, however," Eckhard said.

Eckhard also confirmed earlier announcements that international U.N. staff in Iraq would be drastically reduced. There are now about 400 foreign staff in the country, including about 110 in Baghdad, already down several hundred from before the bombing.

About 50 are expected to be withdrawn from Baghdad along with some 150 out of 300 from northern Iraq. International staff will no longer be based in Basra in the south but will commute from Kuwait instead, U.N. officials said.

"We are trying to minimize the amount of the disruption by allowing people who can as easily do their work outside the country as in Iraq to continue," Eckhard said.

"We are counting on the local Iraqi staff to carry a lot of the burden as far as the humanitarian work is going," he said. "We cannot as efficiently do our work with more than half our international staff out of the country, but we are doing our best."

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