13-year-old girl aborts suicide bombing, surrenders to police

A 13-year-old Iraqi girl wearing a vest packed with explosives turned herself in rather than go through with a suicide bombing in a violence-torn city north of Baghdad, the US military said.

A statement said the girl surrendered to police on Sunday in Baquba, capital of Iraq's restive Diyala province, where Sunni Arab Al-Qaida militants are waging war on US and Iraqi forces. She was still wearing the vest, which police had to remove before detaining her.

"Reports are that she approached the IPs (Iraqi police) saying she had the vest on and didn't want to go through with it," US military spokesman David Russell said yesterday. "If she was forced to put on the vest or if she did it voluntarily, that is still being reviewed."