Iraq Prime Minister Orders Police Forces To Stop Using Useless Bomb Detectors

A device used by Iraqi forces to detect bombs and other weapons at checkpoints has been called useless by the American military. Credit Johan Spanner for The New York Times

Reuters: Iraq PM Abadi orders police to stop using fake bomb detectors

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ordered security services on Sunday to stop using fake bomb detectors at checkpoints after a bombing killed at least 120 people in Baghdad in an attack claimed by Islamic State.

Reacting after the deadliest attack so far this year, Abadi also ordered a new investigation at the interior ministry into "corrupt deals" to buy ADE 651 devices developed as lost golf balls finders and sold to Iraq and other nations as hand-held bomb detectors.

A police officer earlier confirmed to Reuters that these devices, commonly known as the "magic wand", were still in use five years after the scandal about the sale to Iraq broke out.

The British businessman who sold the detectors to Iraq and other countries, James McCormick, was sentenced in 2013 in Britain to 10 years in jail for endangering lives for profit.

Read more ....

Update #1: Abadi orders security to stop using ‘magic wands’ to detect explosives (RUDAW)
Update #2: A corrupt deal for security wands left Iraq vulnerable to Baghdad bomb blast (Mustafa Salim and Loveday Morris, Washington Post)

WNU Editor: I have been posting stories for years on how useless these bomb detectors are .... and I thought they were banned years ago. Apparently not. And who is to blame .... sadly .... the Iraqis themselves .... Iraq Swears by Bomb Detector U.S. Sees as Useless (New York Times).