Thread: Iraq/Dinar Until June 9th 1PM CST

Baghdad, June 4, (VOI)- An Iraqi Parliamentarian from the Kurdistan Coalition said on Monday that a number of parliamentarian blocs' objection to the candidates for the vacant portfolios led to a delay in the lawmakers' voting.
"The Sadrist bloc, lawmakers loyal to the Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, argued that the candidates are not independent or technocratic enough," Mahmoud Othman told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI).
Six ministers, from the Sadrist bloc, withdrew from the government in mid April and the Shiite cleric Sadr authorized the Iraqi Prime Minister to select alternatives from the qualified independent characters.
The Sadrist bloc, a main component of the Shiite parliamentary bloc, has 30 seats out of the 275-seat parliament.
"A number of the parliament's members left the session when it was presented for discussion, which led to lack of quorum," Othman also said.
"The last session was attended by 171 members, but they were busy discussing issues on protecting the parliament's building and when the time came to vote for the reshuffle, only 110 members were present and it was not sufficient according to the constitution to vote for a reshuffle which necessitate the presence of no less than 138 members," he explained.
"The vacant ministries are important as most offer services and there should be an understanding between the blocs to settle the whole issue," the lawmaker noted.
He voiced hope over settling the issue in Tuesday's session.

Lack of quorum? There's something new. Not.
Maybe tomorrow.


Aswat Aliraq

Thanks Lunar,

Looks like we might start seeing other countries peg to the SDR, this including Iraq with the notice of SDR in their charts yesterday.

Thanks again.

Originally Posted by Lunar

Syria to switch peg from dollar to SDR
04/06/2007 12:00 AM (UAE)

Agencies

Abu Dhabi: Syria will link the pound to International Monetary Fund's special drawing rights (SDR) in July, abandoning the peg to the US dollar, the central bank governor said on Monday.

"We will do it now in July," Governor of the Central of Syria Adeeb Mayaleh told reporters in Abu Dhabi. Mayaleh said in October that the change would take place in the first half of 2007, but "we needed some time so we slightly delayed it".

Effective January 1, 2006, the IMF set weightings for the SDR at 44 per cent US dollars, 34 per cent euros, and 11 per cent each of yen and the British pound.

Asked about the weighting of the dollar in the Syrian currency reserves, he said: "There will be no change for the moment and we will keep it at 50-50, but we might change it later on depending on any new development," he said.

Gulfnews: Syria to switch peg from dollar to SDR

Czech firms to cash in on growing export to Iraq
Author: Petra Breyerová <breyerova(at)cbw.cz>, Section: Q & A, Published: 04. 06. 2007

The Czech Embassy in Iraq is laying the groundwork for Czech companies that want to penetrate the worn-torn country. The positive reputation that Czechs gained in Iraq in the past can now help local companies to take advantage of the market’s growing potential, said Jaroslav Reif, the head of the commercial department and first secretary at the Czech Embassy in Iraq.


Starting in this post on June 1, Reif, 45, said that despite ongoing safety issues, Iraq is a country where Czech firms could generate healthy profit provided they respond quickly with the right projects.

Reif, the former head of the foreign department at water-management company Geotest Brno, which also operates in Iraq, took part in the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) where he was responsible for water management in four provinces in southern Iraq. CPA was the transitional government following the invasion of Iraq led by the U.S. and was dissolved in June 2004.


Q: What are your immediate plans in Iraq?

A: I’ve prepared an outline for my activities in Iraq. The aim, in general, is to create good conditions for Czech companies’ successful business operations in Iraq. This activity will focus on an intensive cooperation with the Ministry of Oil in the areas of geological surveys for oilfields and natural gas, and in oil mining. Regarding cooperation with the Ministry of Industry and Minerals, the focus is on the construction of ironworks, ceramic factories and cement works. Also [there are opportunities] for supplying technology for the production of building materials, as Iraq is damaged and will undergo reconstruction. So there will be an enormous need for building materials such as cement, lime and gypsum.


Q: Why do you think Czech firms can succeed in Iraq?

A: I think Czech firms have great chances because Iraqis are interested in Czech experts. As there is an unstable safety situation in Iraq, there aren’t many competitors from other countries; and historically when we look back 50 years, there are many examples of close cooperation [of former Czechoslovakia] with Iraq.

In general, Iraq is one of the countries where the Czech Republic can sell expertise. Nobody in European countries such as France or Germany is as interested in using Czech experts because Western European politics are too protectionist. Things—such as turnkey projects like cement works or geological surveys for oil—that we wouldn’t even dream of trying to sell in Europe can be now sold in Iraq.


Q: Why are Iraqis so particularly interested in Czech experts?

A: [Czechoslovaks] have built up to 10 refineries in Iraq. This represents about 80 percent of all refineries there. All the refineries were built under communism between 1960 and 1980 through then state-owned foreign trade corporations such as Techno-export. For example, geological surveys and searching for oilfields were done through Strojexport but refineries were designed by Chemoprojekt and the firm Chepos [in Brno] participated in their construction. The foreign trade corporations also built ironworks in Basra [south Iraq] and plants for producing tractors and motorcycles of [Czechoslovak] brand Jawa. Regarding foreign trade, [Czechoslovakia was] an important partner for Iraq. For Iraq we were an engineering and technological world power as we built a majority of their industrial enterprises. This is a position we can’t even dream about now. (Editor’s note: Some of the then state-owned corporations such as Technoexport and Chemoprojekt have been transferred to private companies after the fall of communism in 1989 and bear the same name.)


Q: Why were Czechoslovak communist leaders so interested in trading with Iraq?

A: Iraq was a preferred country as it paid in cash in dollars that came from the sale of oil. Czechoslovakia had the same good relations with Iran, too. The contacts in Iraq, Libya and Iran have prevailed from the time of the First Republic [1918-1938]. The relationship with Iraq goes even back to the Austrian-Hungarian Empire [before 1918], when Bohemia was well-known in areas of building engineering plants, cement works and sugar refineries. Bohemia distinguished itself as a long-term contributor to technological values in Iraq, and Iraqis have long remembered this.


Q: Was it mainly the fall of communism that interrupted the thriving cooperation?

A: Political events and relations have always ended the economic cooperation with Iraq. After 1989 we started looking at Saddam Hussein’s [1979 to 2003] regime as a totalitarian dictatorship that needed to be abolished. By then the economic relations had begun to flag. Also [there was] the United Nations’ embargo on trade with Iraq. (Editor’s note: On May 22, 2003, the United Nations Security Council lifted the 12-year embargo on Iraq).


Q: Were there any Czech companies at all operating in Iraq between 1989 and 2003?

A: [Czech companies’] activities in Iraq were very limited during that time as Iraq had issued a boycott on trading with the Czech Republic. So, [Iraqi] contracts with the Czech Republic during that time had to be been done through Slovak companies, which unlike Czech ones, were able to trade with Iraq. The reason behind this embargo was that the Czech state expressed a negative political opinion on Saddam’s regime and supported anti-Saddam activities [led by the U.S.].


Q: How much money did Czechoslovakia get from Iraq?

A: It’s difficult to figure this out. Each contract had a value of several million dollars. Every year there were perhaps 10 such contracts.


Q: Why was this year and last year so successful for Czech companies in closing big contracts in Iraq?

A: This is a result of an effort that has been made since 2004. There is a safety vacuum in Iraq that delays everything—the things you think they will take a year, end up taking three years. We [have also gained] a very strong position in Iraq as we provided a field hospital in Basra during to the conflict [led by U.S. and Britain between March 18 and May 1, 2003]. The Czech Republic has gained a great image there and will live on this image there for another 20 years. The chance for creating such an image can be done only during a conflict. It’s a sad fact, but if it wasn’t for the war, the Czech Republic would never have had such a great chance to enter the Iraqi market.


Q: How important is it for a Czech company to be present in Iraq?

A: Unless a firm is present in Iraq it’s as if it doesn’t exist. If the company isn’t in Iraq physically it will never get any big deals. It works like this in the whole Arab world. Without a physical presence in Iraq, a firm can only glean small contracts. There are only a few companies that have branches in Iraq. For example, Technoexport has a representation in Baghdad that is, of course, operated by Iraqis [because of the security reasons] or firm Unis, which is building a refinery in Basra, operates there or [water-management company] Geotest Brno has branches in Basra and Erbil [in the Kurdish part of north Iraq].


Q: Are you planning to increase activities of the Czech Embassy’s commercial representation in Erbil, which opened last year?

A: Certainly, and we also plan to open the same branch in Basra this year. The head of Erbil’s branch is a Kurdish engineer, in the case of Basra it will be an Arab engineer who will gather information and details and prepare negotiations for Czech companies so that the firms’ operations in these territories will be successful and safe. n

Gunmen kidnap Iraqi senior official in Baghdad

Gunmen kidnapped an Iraqi senior official and his son in northern Baghdad on Monday, an Interior Ministry source said.

"Unidentified gunmen riding three cars kidnapped Saad Majid Ali, director general in the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, and his son at around 3:00 p.m. (1100 GMT) in Waziyriah neighborhood," the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

Ali was driving his car with his son when the attack occurred, the source added.

Earlier in the day, a roadside bomb went off in Baghdad's southern neighborhood of Zaafaraniyah near a minibus carrying casual workers, killing one of them and wounding 12 others, the source said.

Violence griped the Iraq capital despite more than three months of a U.S.-led security crackdown, which has not achieved substantial progress in reducing violence in Iraq.

Source: Xinhua

Marketing More than 9000 Ton Wheat & Barley

04 June 2007 (Al-Sabaah)

Quantities of the marketing wheat and barley in Dhiqar province amount to more than 9 000 tons until the first days of the current month from the total planting areas which forming 600 000 acres, while the province preparing to plant more than 22 000 acres within rice in six sub districts of the province.

On the other hand, general director of the province department Abdul Hussein Salih Najm declared in a press statement that, the marketing from the farmers of the wheat quantities to the ministry stores amounted more than 9 000 ton distributed as 5902 ton as a first and second standard of the wheat which marketing from 15 sub district and sector, and marketing of 1537 ton of barley which marketing from the same areas.

U.S. denies role in Iraq oil law

WASHINGTON, 03 June 2007 (UPI)

The United States did not write Iraq's draft oil law and is not telling Baghdad what to do, a State Department official said in response to allegations.

The senior department official, who spoke to United Press International on condition of anonymity, said "no one has secretly drafted" the law, calling such accusations a "gross exaggeration."

The official said it is "critical" that the law be an "Iraqi product."

Negotiators are still stuck on key aspects of oil ownership and revenue sharing as negotiations continue.

Mohammed al-Dynee, a member of the Iraqi Front for National Dialogue's contingent in the Parliament, told UPI the Parliament will reject the law he says was drafted with oil company interests in mind. The law, if approved as is, would allow -- though doesn't guarantee -- foreign oil companies access to a portion of the producing fields and all future fields, which is most of Iraq's oil.

Other opponents in and out of Iraq point to Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001, which included a wish list for privatizing Iraq's oil; a pre-war working group of the U.S. State Department that focused on Iraq's oil sector; the U.S. Agency for International Development's contract with McLean, Va.-based consultant BearingPoint for "broad economic reform" of Iraq, including the oil sector; and a meeting organized by the U.S. Energy Department last year in Washington between the oil minister and the heads of oil companies.

The State Department official confirmed an oil attorney is providing technical assistance, when asked by Iraqis, as part of the BearingPoint contract, helping explore various countries' models for oil law and specific language in them.

"What's absolutely critical to stress is negotiations are between the Kurdistan Regional Government and the Iraqi government," the official said, adding there is "no particular way to compel them to take our advice."

And when the two sides reach loggerheads, the U.S. attempts to mediate.

"There have been some times when we've tried to facilitate an impasse," the official said, saying Ambassador Ryan Crocker invited both parties to dinner to "bring both sides together to find a way through the impasse ... a fairly standard tactic."

Zones for Iraqi industry to support US military
By Paul Schemm



04 June 2007 (AFP)

After years using outside contractors to tend to the needs of its Iraq bases, the US military is now building zones outside its army posts so Iraqi businesses can actually benefit from their presence.

The plan, which has been several months in preparation, is part of a wider effort to stimulate local employment and end years of funnelling lucrative contracts to providers from outside the country.

"Let's get American and third country contractors out of that business and let's get Iraqis into that business," Brigadier Steven Anderson, a driving force behind the programme, told AFP.

"Let's get Iraqis employed and get them out of the bomb-making business and into the support-providing business," added the deputy chief of staff for resources and sustainment.

The Iraq-based industrial zone (I-BIZ) programme was conceived last year when military commanders recognised the need to boost employment to put a dent in the violence raging throughout the country.

"There is a clear focus both by the Iraqi government and on the part of the US mission of beginning this process to see more jobs created," a US official in Baghdad told reporters in May.

The idea is comparatively simple and mirrors the support industries to be found outside US bases in South Korea and Germany. It will involve building a protected area for Iraqis to provide products, services and maintenance.

The plan is a major departure from the first four years of the US presence in Iraq when nearly every need was provided by large US contractors such as Kellogg Brown and Root, a Halliburton subsidiary.

KBR in turn brought in thousands of foreign workers, mainly from south Asia.

Unlike citizens from other countries hosting US bases, Iraqis have seen few financial benefits from having more than 140,000 US troops in their country.

A December 2004 suicide attack on a US military dining facility in Mosul killed 14 soldiers and for all intents and purposes ended the employment of locals on bases.

Iraqi unemployment was bad before the 2003 US invasion, but following a series of decisions by the Coalition Provisional Authority to disband the army and shut down state-owned industries, it soared to an estimated 48 percent.

Shortly before his tour ended last year, the number two US commander in Iraq, Lieutenant General Peter Chiarelli, described a new push to find simple ways of boosting employment.

"Provincial governors tell me that creating jobs will have the most impact on building a safe society -- they tell me 'put the angry young men to work; find jobs for them'," he said on December 8.

One of the most tangible results of this shift is the ongoing mission by Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Brinkely to restart dozens of mothballed state-owned factories.

The I-BIZ programme would coordinate with Brinkley's efforts and the reopened factories could have storefronts in the industrial zones, Anderson said.

For now, the project is in its infancy, with a two-year-old prototype near the southern city of Diwaniyah. The first true zone will open in August next to the massive Camp Victory base at Baghdad airport.

Over the next year, further zones will appear at Tikrit's Camp Speicher, at Camp Taji just north of Baghdad and at Talil Air Base, in the south near Nasiriyah.

"We are thinking big but starting small," Anderson said.

The gradual start is in marked contrast to the grandiose approaches of the early years when the focus was on ambitious projects that often foundered, especially in light of security challenges.

Since so many contractors working with multinational forces have been assassinated by insurgents, the zones will be enclosed within high walls and have disguised entrances.

"You are providing a secure area that the Iraqis can set up their business and operate their businesses in, but it's not part of the interior base itself," Anderson said, noting that normal defensive procedures would continue.

Construction began six weeks ago on the Camp Victory Iraqi zone which will hold around 35 businesses over 25 acres.

The model is a series of Iraqi industries clustered around the Polish-run Camp Echo base near Diwaniyah where carpenters, mechanics, and welders serve the base.

"It's pretty isolated, and that's one the reasons why it's a thriving I-BIZ because it is so isolated and it really desperately needs that kind of support," Anderson said.

He envisions the zones filled with recycling industries that would restore old generators, recycle tyres, treat waste oil and revive spent batteries.

"The military consumes thousands of lead acid batteries every month. Very few of them are reclaimed, there are estimates that perhaps 80-90 percent of these batteries could be," he said.

"There are battery shops like that all over the world, but there's nothing like that here yet.

"If you build it they will come, and that's my philosophy. People really don't take you serious until they get an opportunity to see what you got."

Iraq, Jordan to sign free-trade agreement


04 June 2007 (Azzaman)

Iraq and Jordan are in talks for a free-trade agreement to boost commercial ties between the countries.

Iraqi Trade Minister Abdulfalah al-Sudani and his Jordanian counterpart Salem Khazaa have met recently in Amman to work out a framework for the agreement.

Sudani said he would send a special team to Amman “to revitalize trade exchange and work on the free-trade pact.”

However, Sudani admitted that the flow of trade between the countries was facing “some hurdles.”

Jordan was Iraq’s top trade partner before the 2003 U.S. invasion. Amman received all its energy needs from Baghdad at preferential treatment.

Bilateral trade, which surpassed $1 billion a year, has dropped substantially with Iraq now importing most of its needs from Iran, Syria and Turkey.

The upsurge in violence has affected trade. The highway to Amman is dangerous with bandits and rebels attacking trucks and passengers.

The countries signed a memorandum of understanding following the U.S. invasion under which Iraq was to meet up to 30 percent of Jordan energy needs estimated at more than 100,000 barrels a day.

But the lack of security, Sudani said, has made it difficult to implement the agreeme

Activating of Medical Operations Role Department

Baghdad, 04 June 2007 (Al-Sabaah)

Specialized medical services operations department in health ministry, prepared a plan to activate it's role in facing a terrorism processes in cooperating with the general inspector office at the ministry.

General director of the department Dr. Ali Lateef said that, the plan put in arrangement with the meaning official ministries represents such as interior, defense, national security, water resources and oil, were divided as a short, middle and far plan were focused on developing emergency room by adding stuff from the general company of marketing the medicine and Karch plus Risafa health department and medicine city department.

MOH receives 20 typical medical centers


Baghdad, 04 June 2007 (Al-Sabaah)

Ministry of Health prepares to receive 20 typical medical centers in Baghdad through next month within the American donation for ministry of health.

General Director of engineering projects directorate in the ministry said that these centers would be received and that number of centers will be 26 in Baghdad out of 142 centers were to be received last year.

He showed that work rate on these centers reached 95% except those which located in hot spots which work rate reached from 5% to 85%.