Thread: Archive Latest News - Think Tank - 16/08/07 - 03/11/07

Former Iraqi President Abdel-Rahman Aref laid to rest in Mafraq

Former Iraqi President Abdul Rahman Aref, 91, was laid to rest in Jordan Saturday, an Iraqi diplomat said.

Aref, who was overthrown more than 35 years ago in a coup that brought Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party to power, died Friday dawn at the King Hussein Medical Centre, the Associated Press reported.

Iraqi Charge d’Affaires in Amman Tahseen Alwan Ina said funeral services were held for Aref at the Qaluti Mosque in Amman’s Rabyeh District followed by burial in the Iraqi Army Martyrs’ Cemetery in the town of Mafraq, some 70 kilometres north of the capital.

Iraq’s Interior Minister Jawad Bolani represented Iraqi President Jalal Talabani at the funeral services.

Sheikh Harith Dhari, a top Sunni Arab leader who heads the Association of Muslim Scholars and Iraq’s Ambassador to Jordan Saad Hayyani also attended the ceremony.

In Baghdad, Talabani expressed his condolences over Aref’s death and said the former president had “worked to serve his people” and would “always be remembered in the country’s history”.

“He was a free officer, a military commander, a president of the republic. He was a model of integrity and tolerance,” Talabani added.

Aref, who is survived by five children, had settled in Jordan after leaving Iraq following the US-led invasion that toppled former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein in 2003.

In a rare interview after Saddam’s overthrow, Aref urged Iraqis to forget the past and work for a better future.

“I hope there will be stability and security in all parts of Iraq and neighbouring Arab countries. I hope they will flourish,” Aref told the AP in Baghdad in 2003.

“I hope there will be national unity in Iraq by forgetting the past and looking for the future,” he added.

Aref took part in the 1958 military coup led by his brother Abdul Salam Aref that overthrew the Iraqi monarchy, Agence France-Presse reported.

After his brother died in a helicopter crash - the circumstances of which have never been fully explained - he ruled the country from 1966 to 1968, until he himself was ousted in a Baathist coup led by General Ahmad Hassan Bakr, aided by Saddam Hussein.

The former Iraqi president served the shortest time of all the Iraqi republican leaders and reached his end the most peacefully, according to AFP.

The general, not known for his charisma, was an exception in the gallery of presidents who have held the post since 1958 - three of whom died violently while the death of the fourth has always been shrouded in mystery.

Born in Baghdad in 1916, Aref began his political career in the 1950s within the “Supreme Committee of Free Officers”, which toppled the Iraqi monarchy on July 14, 1958, with the aid of the communists and the Baathists.

General Abdul Karim Qasim, who masterminded the coup, was made first head of state of the republic while Aref’s brother Abdel Salam became his deputy.

Qasim was considered too close to the communists and in February 1963, Aref’s brother seized power in a coup. Qasim was executed with a bullet to the head, AFP said.

While his brother was president, Abdul Rahman became chief of staff of the army and was placed in charge of negotiations with the Kurds, a process he would continue when he was president.

During his presidency, he moved Iraq closer to France and was welcomed in February 1968 by General Charles de Gaulle during a visit described as “historic” in Paris.

During the visit, he signed contracts supplying oil to France while ordering Mirage military aircraft.

After being ousted, he lived in exile in Turkey before returning to Iraq in 1979.

Bakr, meanwhile, was sidelined in 1979 by Saddam Hussein and he died in 1982 of an illness some attributed to poisoning.

Former Iraqi President Abdel-Rahman Aref laid to rest in Mafraq | Iraq Updates

Iraqi translators struggle for safety and a visa

Abu Usama, accused of being a spy for working as a US military translator, thought he would protect his family from retribution if he left Iraq.

In January, four months after he went alone to Jordan, his father, brother and brother-in-law were snatched by suspected Al Qaeda fighters near their home in western Baghdad. None has been seen since. All are presumed dead.

Abu Usama’s story is typical of many of the thousands of Iraqis who put their lives at risk by working as translators for the Americans, British and others whose forces are fighting Iraq’s relentless insurgency.

For a few hundred dollars a month and with a dream of helping to build a new Iraq -or of a visa to get out - they put themselves and their families in danger of reprisals by Sunni Islamists and Shiite militias.

Many are in limbo, stuck in third countries like Jordan and Syria, where an estimated two million Iraqis have fled.

Translators interviewed by Reuters refused to give their names for fear of retribution.

“Abu Usama” - the name is an alias - earned about $350 a month working for a US military police unit in Abu Ghraib, a violent Sunni Arab neighbourhood in western Baghdad. “It was a very terrible place,” he said.

He twice received death threats, one delivered in a message to his front gate. He decided to go, leaving behind his wife, six-year-old son and four-year-old daughter. Their third child was born two months after he left.
“I am without work and it is very difficult for me to get them here,” he told Reuters by telephone from Amman.

“I came here to Jordan to emigrate to America. It is very difficult. I have passed one year here trying,” Abu Usama said.

It is hard to get an exact figure for how many Iraqis work as translators for US military and reconstruction teams.

Most work for a contractor which pays about 8,000 translators a flat fee of $750 a month. They can earn bonuses of $150 a month if they live with their units and another $150 if they go out on patrols.

Beheaded

“Shak”, who lives in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone with his wife and five children, believes in his work and says US forces are trying to help the people of Iraq.

But he also knows the risks after the body of a 26-year-old colleague was found last year near Sadr City, a sprawling Shiite slum in Baghdad and stronghold of powerful anti-American cleric Moqtada Sadr’s feared Mehdi Army militia.

“They found an ID badge in his pocket that said he worked for US forces. Unfortunately, they cut off his head. He was my friend,” Shak told Reuters.

Many try to keep their work secret in a bid to protect themselves and their families.

“A woman in my neighbourhood stopped me and asked if I worked for the Americans,” said “Sal”, who lives in Rusafa in Baghdad’s predominantly Shiite east.

“I laughed and said: ‘I wish I worked for the Americans. I don’t speak English. I work in a supermarket’. I don’t think she believed me,” he said.

The US Department of Homeland Security said in May it could accept as many as 7,000 refugees through the 2007 fiscal year. This was after President George W. Bush’s administration came under fire from Congress for accepting only 466 Iraqi refugees since the US-led invasion in 2003.

The US embassy in Baghdad said in a statement that the Bush administration was separately seeking legislation from Congress that would grant special immigration visas to all eligible “locally engaged staff” after three years of service.

“The administration is committed to taking care of the many brave Iraqis who have worked or are working for the United States in Iraq,” the statement said.

The treatment of translators in Iraq gained greater prominence in July after Denmark said it had secretly airlifted about 200 translators and other Iraqi employees and their families out of Iraq.

An admission this month that automatic asylum would not be granted to the 90-odd interpreters working with the 5,000-strong British force in southern Iraq was soon followed by newspaper headlines like “Abandoned - The 91 Iraqis Who Risked All”.

US efforts so far come as little comfort to the thousands of Iraqis like Abu Usama who are still without visas and want Washington to follow Copenhagen’s example.

“We helped them undertake their mission. We are not warriors, we are civilians,” Abu Usama said.

“We helped to free Iraq. It was bad luck for us.”

Iraqi translators struggle for safety and a visa | Iraq Updates

Bush pleads for more patience for Iraq war efforts

US President George W. Bush, faced with growing calls to start withdrawing US troops from Iraq, pleaded with Americans on Saturday for patience and cited progress in the past two months.

"The success of the past couple of months have shown that conditions on the ground can change - and they are changing," he said in his weekly radio address.

"We cannot expect the new strategy we are carrying out to bring success overnight."

Bush is facing mounting pressure from Democrats and a senior Republican lawmaker to begin pulling US forces out of Iraq to show the government there that the American commitment is not open-ended.

Earlier last week, Bush drew parallels to the Vietnam war, raising the example of the emergence of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and violence in Vietnam after US troops pulled out to warn of the consequences of leaving Iraq.

But, he acknowledged that de****e increasing the number of troops in Iraq to tamp down the unrelenting violence, there was growing frustration that the government had not made much progress on political goals.

Still, Bush argued that young men were signing up for the Iraqi military, police were patrolling the streets and more operations with both US-led troops and Iraqi forces were being conducted.

On Thursday, he suffered a setback when Senator John Warner of Virginia, an influential congressional voice on military affairs in Bush's Republican Party, urged for an initial pullout of 5,000 troops who would be home by December.

Warner declined to back setting a withdrawal timetable but Democrats are expected next month to ratchet up pressure to do just that.

In about three weeks, Congress will receive a pivotal report on the state of war in Iraq by the US commander on the ground in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, and the US ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, which could trigger a change in Iraq policy.

Democrats argued the failures of the Vietnam war should not be ignored as the United States tries to chart its future course in Iraq but that US soldiers could no longer bear the brunt of the failures by the Iraqi government.

"We can't expect our soldiers to continue to risk their lives especially when the Iraqi leaders themselves show no interest in achieving a peaceful political solution," Max Cleland, a former Democratic senator from Georgia and a Vietnam veteran, said in his party's weekly radio address.

Bush on Tuesday will try to build his case further for remaining in Iraq when he speaks to the American Legion annual convention in Reno, Nevada, the second of two such speeches.

"I will focus on the Middle East and why the rise of a free and democratic Iraq is critical to the future of this vital region and to our Nation's security," Bush said

Curfew in Baghdad as Shiites head to shrine city

Meanwhile, Iraq on Saturday imposed an indefinite curfew on two-wheelers and hand carts in Baghdad and its surrounds as thousands of Shiite pilgrims headed to the shrine city of Karbala for a major festival.

The curfew came hours after a car bomb in Baghdad's Shiite neighbourhood of Kadhimiyah killed seven people and wounded 30, according to medical and security officials.

"An indefinite curfew has been imposed on two-wheelers and hand carts, but not on other vehicles such as cars," Brigadier General Qassim Atta, spokesman for the Iraqi military in Baghdad, told Agence France-Presse.

State television Al Iraqiya earlier incorrectly quoted Atta as saying that a total and indefinite ban on all vehicles had been imposed.

Since February, when US and Iraqi forces launched a massive military assault in the capital to curb the daily bloodshed, Baghdad has been under a daily curfew between 10:00pm and 6:00am.

The latest ban is apparently aimed at averting attacks by Sunni insurgents on Shiites who are heading on Karbala to celebrate Tuesday's anniversary of the birth of Mohammed Al Mahdi, the 12th Imam of Shiite Islam.

Karbala police spokesman Rahman Mshawi said some two million Shiite pilgrims are expected to descend on the city, 110 kilometres south of Baghdad.

Shiite Muslims believe the imam disappeared from the northern Iraqi town of Samarra centuries ago but will return one day to save the world.
Shiites, a minority in Muslim world, are a majority in Iraq and regularly head to Karbala to celebrate major festivals of their sect. But they have often come under attack, allegedly from Sunni extremists.

Mshawi said police had set up extra checkpoints on the western side of the province which borders the Sunni Anbar province, a stronghold of Al Qaeda-led insurgents.

‘Working with Sunnis to eliminate Al Qaeda’

A US commander, meanwhile, said on Saturday his forces are working with former Sunni enemies to root out Al Qaeda cells fighting north of Baghdad.

Colonel David Sutherland said fighters from the Sunni Brigades of the 1920 Revolution acted as scouts and informants for US and Iraqi forces during a recent operation to secure an area around Baqouba, capital of Diyala province.

"We call them concerned local nationals. These are people, patriots that have come forward and joined the security process," Sutherland told reporters through a video link from Diyala.

"They are working with my soldiers, they are working with Iraqi security forces to assist us with information with being the eyes and ears."

The 1920 Brigades, which took their name from the date of an Iraqi uprising against British rule, were founded to fight American forces in the aftermath of the March 2003 invasion, which overthrew dictator Saddam Hussein.

The group's fighters are mainly Sunni Arabs and include many former members of Saddam's army. The outfit has claimed responsibility for bomb attacks on US troops, but said it is not involved in attacks on Iraqi civilians.

In recent months there have been several reports from Baghdad and from the western province of Anbar that the 1920 Brigades are increasingly now working alongside their former foes in order to defeat Al Qaeda's Iraqi affiliate.

While the group has denied these claims in messages on extremist websites, the apparent switch in sides comes after several Sunni tribal leaders who had been sympathetic to the "resistance" turned against Al Qaeda's tactics.

Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's Shiite-led government has expressed concern at the new US policy of working with Sunni insurgent factions, fearing they will turn into an armed opposition.

US commanders, however, believe that their allies will prove invaluable in defeating irreconcilable militant groups such as Al Qaeda in Iraq.

The US military, meanwhile, said on Saturday its troops had found a building south of Baghdad believed to have been used as an execution chamber by Al Qaeda militants.

Bush pleads for more patience for Iraq war efforts | Iraq Updates

Britain pulls out troops from Basra's joint coordination center

Britain started to withdraw its troops from the Joint Coordination Center in central Basra as part of its plan to hand the center over to Iraqi security forces, the Multi-National Force (MNF) in southern Iraq said.

"The withdrawn troops moved to the British base at Basra International Airport in the northwest of the city," an MNF media spokesman in southern Iraq, Major Matthew Bird, told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI), indicating that British troops will remain in the former presidential palaces and continue its cooperation with Iraqi security forces.

In statements to VOI, Maj. Bird denied British plans for troop pullout from Basra, but indicated that the British forces will hand over to Iraqi forces its bases in the presidential palaces and the joint coordination center.

The British forces in Basra, 590 km south of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, keep 5,500 troops within the Multi-National Force in Iraq after withdrawing 1,600 soldiers during the past few months.

Britain is the United States' prime ally in the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Britain pulls out troops from Basra's joint coordination center | Iraq Updates

Allawi's party: hiring public relations office is standard practice

Having an agreement with a think-tank and public relations office is a practice known all over the world, said a member of former Iraqi Premier Iyad Allawi's Iraqi National Accord (INA) party on Sunday.

"The practice is not new, particularly in democratic and advanced nations," Luay al-Saiedi, commenting on a report published by CNN in which it said Allawi agreed with a U.S. company to organize a media campaign to have him back to power in Iraq, was quoted in a statement received by the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI).

Saiedi is a leading figure in the INA, part of the Allawi's Iraqi National List (INL) bloc in the Iraqi parliament.

"The aim of this contract was to propagate inside western and international organizations for Iraq's national unity and merger into its Arab and Islamic fold and also for the need to expand the roles played by the United Nations, the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) and the Arab League as far as security and national reconciliation in Iraq are concerned," said Saiedi.

A report by CNN said earlier on Sunday that a public campaign to undermine Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government was launched by a powerhouse Republican firm and former interim Premier Allawi.

Quoting a senior U.S. administration official, the report said that the lobbying campaign is launched by Barbour Griffith & Rogers, which is "blasting e-mails all over town" criticizing al-Maliki and promoting its client, Allawi, as an alternative to the current Iraqi leader.

The report revealed a contract between BGR and Allawi stipulating that the firm would be paid "a monthly fee of US$50,000 in quarterly installments of $150,000 beginning on August 1, 2007" in consideration of its services.

The report also said that CNN received an email indicating, "BGR sent a mass message Tuesday to congressional staffers with the subject line, 'A new leader in Iraq,'" in which the firm introduced Allawi as a potential successor to the current prime minister.

"The lobbying e-mails were sent Tuesday, the day after (U.S. Senator) Levin called for the ouster of al-Maliki upon return from an official trip to Iraq with (Sen.) Warner. Also on Tuesday, President Bush appeared to be softening his support for al-Maliki at a press conference by expressing frustration with the pace of progress by the Iraqi government," said the report.

"The lobbying firm boasts the services of two onetime foreign policy hands of President Bush: Ambassador Robert Blackwill, the former Deputy National Security Adviser, and Philip Zelikow, former counselor to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice," it added.

According to an official document released by the U.S. Department of Justice and published on Radio Sawa's official website on Sunday, the firm will provide "strategic counsel and representation for and on behalf of Allawi before the U.S. government, Congress, media and others."

"All resources of BGR would be available to Dr. Allawi and his moderate Iraqi colleagues as we undertake this work. However, BGR will designate a core team of professionals who will be dedicated to this work," read the document.

Allawi's party: hiring public relations office is standard practice | Iraq Updates

US firms deny Iraqi deals

US retailers such as JC Penney and Wal-Mart have denied they are close to agreeing import deals involving clothing goods from Iraq, reported the Los Angeles Times-Washington Post.

The firms have cited the uncertain political environment in the war-torn nation and the questionable viability of suppliers. It is now hoped that European and Middle East based retailers will step in to buy the clothes.

US firms deny Iraqi deals | Iraq Updates

Iraq business and investment conference to be held in Dubai

The Government of Iraq in cooperation with the US Government Task Force for Business Stability Operations (BSO) in Iraq will host an Iraq Business and Investment Conference in Dubai from 28 to 30 August 2007.

Over 100 high net worth businesspeople from the Southern Governorates of Iraq will be in Dubai to highlight investment and profit opportunities to GCC and international businesses.

The conference aims to stimulate trade and investment in the south of the country by showcasing companies with clearly defined projects seeking outside financing from qualified investors. Investment opportunities will range from smaller businesses in need of a minimum of $1 million in financing to large enterprises seeking $200 million.

The conference is focused on sound investment opportunities that are ready to move forward immediately rather than any specific industries. It will also assist potential investors by including discussions on the investment environment and related laws in Iraq. The conference is already attracting significant international interest with companies attending from America, Australia, Europe, Japan, China and GCC countries.

Similar conferences earlier in the year were held in the UAE for the western portion of Iraq and the Kurdistan Regional Government.
Companies and organizations from the GCC negotiated over 65 joint ventures in western Iraq while the Kurdistan regional conference generated over US $230 million of trade and investment over the three-day conference.

The Iraq Business and Investment Conference provides a ground floor opportunity for companies and organizations based in the UAE and GCC to trade and invest in a region that provides the appropriate governance, infrastructure and business opportunities in an attractive investment environment.

Iraq business and investment conference to be held in Dubai | Iraq Updates

Oil Committee in Kirkuk to sell a part of its crude oil

Jamal Mawlud member of Oil, Industry and Minerals Committee in Kirkuk Province Council affirmed that the regional Administration intends to sell a part of Oil production in order to soothe oil derivatives crisis from which the city suffers.

Oil Committee in Kirkuk to sell a part of its crude oil | Iraq Updates

Buyouts for Iraq operators

Small firms which have already launched operations in Iraq, especially in the more stable, semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan, could become potential takeover targets according to energy analysts cited by Reuters.

The possibility of buyouts will rise once the war-torn's nation's oil law is passed within the next month.

Firms such as Norway's DNO and Canada's WesternZagros are both possible targets.

Buyouts for Iraq operators | Iraq Updates

Basra readies itself for British troop pull-out
Policy experts warn of more chaos ahead after British defeat in southern Iraq.

After four and a half inconclusive years of fighting, British forces are to pull out from their last base in the oil port of Basra and trust their Iraqi comrades to take their place.

When the 500 troops evacuate Saddam Hussein's former palace on the banks of the Shatt al-Arab waterway and withdraw to a desert airbase, they will leave behind a city in the grip of a brutal turf war between rival militia.

Nevertheless, Iraqi forces and war-weary local civilians are hopeful that the redeployment, which will leave just 5,000 British troops in the country to train and support Iraqi forces, will herald a new start for Basra.

"I believe the security apparatus will be able to control the situation if they withdraw completely," said Brigadier Ali Ibrahim of an Iraqi army border guards unit. "We want the British to leave so things will improve."

As he spoke, police and army units could be seen on most of downtown Basra's main roads, where shops and markets were open and busy, and hundreds of Shiite pilgrims gathered to ride buses to the holy city of Karbala.

For police Lieutenant Colonel Karim al-Zaydi, there is no reason why this sense of calm cannot continue once the British leave town.

"We're expecting the British forces to withdraw any time now," he said at the city's Hakkaniyah police station. "The Iraqi army and police have been cooperating for a long time and are ready to take charge of security."

The apparent optimism among Iraqis, however, stands in marked contrast to the pessimism of foreign observers. Many policy experts now speak candidly of a British defeat in southern Iraq, and warn of more chaos ahead.

The International Crisis Group think tank warned in June that the withdrawal would be seen as a victory by the Shiite militias who bombard British bases daily and control much of the city's economic and political life.

"Basra's residents and militiamen view this as not an orderly withdrawal but rather as an ignominious defeat. Today, the city is controlled by militias, seemingly more powerful and unconstrained than before," its report said.

This month, Professor Anthony Cordesman of Washington's respected Centre for Strategic and International Studies warned that Iraq's eastern neighbour Iran would also be encouraged by what he called "the British defeat."

"British weakness and failure in the south has both encouraged Shiite extremism and partially opened the door to Iran," he said, warning US forces in north and central Iraq not to rush to follow the Basra model.

British commanders, who have had 159 troops killed in Iraq, defend their tactics, insisting they never intended to rule Basra on behalf of the Iraqis.
"Our mission there was to get the place and the people to a state where the Iraqis could run the country if they chose to and we are very nearly there," the head of British forces, Air Chief Marshall Sir Jock Stirrup, said.

"Our mission was not to make the place look somewhere green and peaceful because that was never going to be achievable in that timescale and, in any case, only the Iraqis can fulfill that aspiration," he told the BBC.

Who will rule Basra now is, however, an open question. One notorious figure last week tried to claim credit for the British retreat.

"We heard and you heard too, of the intention of British troops to withdraw from our beloved southern Iraq. Congratulations are due to us, to you and to the honest resistance," radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr told supporters.

Sadr's Mahdi Army militia is a loosely organised force of neighbourhood Shiite gangs, and may not be entirely under his control, but it remains one of Iraq's most powerful factions and a serious contender for control in Basra.

It will dispute the city with other Shiite groups, and clashes have already broken out with the Fadhila Party for control of a port that dominates Iraq's oil exports, which in turn account for 97 percent of government revenue.

No date has been set for the British departure from Basra Palace. Press reports from London suggest that it may be imminent, while the official line in Iraq is simply that it will be before the end of the year.

But for many Basrawis, living on top of one of the world's largest supplies of energy but enjoying less than eight hours of power per day in 45-degree (115-degree Fahrenheit) heat, the troops have long since worn out their welcome.

"They did not develop the city as the people in Basra had dreamt of. They did nothing so their departure is for the best," said Munir Abdul-Jalil, a 25-year-old carpenter from the downtown Al-Ashar district.

Basra readies itself for British troop pull-out | Iraq Updates