Thread: Archive Latest News - Dinar Think Tank - 27/08/08 - 15/01/09

Update.......

Al-Bayati: talks with Arab capitals to debt forgiveness on Iraq

The Alliance MP Abbas al-Bayati, a member of the Arab parliament and an agreement between Baghdad and Arab capitals to conduct interviews and talks to reach a rescheduling of debt forgiveness to Iraq as part of bilateral agreements. Bayati said in a press release posted on the Tigris Radio today, Saturday, "There will be bilateral meetings between Iraq and Arab countries to establish mechanisms and understanding with them on how to reschedule the debt and brought down part of bilateral agreements." Al-Bayati said, "The objective of debt and compensation were in the forefront of what was discussed with the Interim Arab Parliament Speaker Jassem Mohammad Al-Saqer", announcing the near visit eagle to Baghdad to discuss three important issues, is the debt and reparations and the latest developments in Iraq, in addition to the Arab position is new , As al-Bayati, a more positive toward the Iraqi people. Al-Bayati said, "The Falcon showed great understanding of Iraq's claim to cut debt and the closure of the issue of compensation, has promised to approach the Kuwaiti authorities to cooperate with Iraq in connection with debt." The Finance Minister Bayan Jabr had submitted a proposal to Kuwait to cut the compensation cuts from 5 percent to 1 percent. A parliamentary source said Kuwaiti officials promised to study the proposal, while stressing that the decision by deductions from the Security Council.

Translated version of http://almalafpress.net/index.php?m=39

Iraqi Parliament to discuss discords on Article 24

The Iraqi parliament is going to hold a session today to discuss the discords on the elections law for the provincial councils especially article 24 of this law regarding the elections of Kirkuk province council.

Frayd Rawanduzi the MP and the Spokesperson of the Kurdistan Alliance Bloc said that the discussions on the elections law were hampered after adopting a new project by those who rejected the proposal of Staffan De Mistura, the U.N envoy to Iraq.

He expected the situation to collapse if the other side insisted to refuse De Mistura’s proposal particularly if the Speaker of the Parliament put forth this issue for voting without having a political consensus.

http://pukmedia.com/english/index.ph...=6572&Itemid=1

Optimism of Iraqi Political forces to pass Election Law in the Parliament today

Iraqi political forces expressed optimism can reach an agreement on the law of provincial elections, expected to be made to a parliamentary committee report to Parliament on the matter today, Sunday, with the support of most political forces. He expected the Attorney Hamid burdensome on the «coalition» that «a report of the Joint Commission of the problem regions and governorates and the legal clauses have the support of the majority and the consent of the parties that has already expressed its objection to the law».

The Malp, a leader in «the Supreme Islamic Council of Iraq», newspaper «Life» London that the «decision to set aside the election law, issued by the Presidency Council, required a consensus among all parties» He added that «the report will address the reasons for the veto will include merging the paragraphs by the United Nations representative in Iraq, Stefan de Mitsora in his own version of the law within the first and second, as well as the integration of some of the demands contained in paragraph 24, which is the root of the problem controversial». The presence of « Some sort of consensus among the majority of the initial blocks to pass the election law »said« there are differences over wording, not substance ». He hoped that «the support of a report and the consensus of all parliamentary parties to pass the law». To this end, a Kurdish lawmaker Abdul Khaliq Zangana «deal» most forces on the report of the Committee, said the same newspaper that «the draft de Mitsora of 7 points, and its exit from the dispute On the electoral law ».

He added: «We agree on the draft de Mitsora despite the fact that it does not contain any concessions to Kurds» and hope that «the report has the support of the majority bloc and contribute to the passage of the law». For his part, MP Omar Abdul Sattar on «Accordance Front»

The «Parliament will pass the paragraphs will be included in the report of the Committee if he maintains the coalition and Kurdish alliance» He pointed out that «the parliament therefore passed the electoral law despite the objections of other parties, the Kurdish Pthafahm with the coalition majority, especially if the parties jointly together with some parliamentary».

Despite that Sattar is expected that the report of the day «support of the majority of parties», but did not rule out, however, set aside the election law, if approved by the Council presidency, any of the Office of Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi »leader« Islamic Party ».

http://translate.google.co.uk/transl...hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Woman possessing faked money arrested in Sulaimani

A source in the Asaish (security) Directorate said that their forces in cooperation with the Sulaimani Asaish forces arrested a woman of the Arab nationality in Sulaimani after searching her house and finding an amount of the Iraqi faked money of 10.000 Iraqi Dinars value.

The woman confessed that she brought the money from Baghdad. She is now under arrest according to article 281 of the Iraqi penalty law until completing the investigations with her.

http://pukmedia.com/english/index.ph...=6579&Itemid=1

SOFA to be signed soon: U.S negotiator

Head of political and military affairs at U.S embassy Michel Corbin said that the security pact between Iraq and U.S is going to be signed soon, denying any differences with the Iraqi negotiator team.

Corbin who is a member in the U.S negotiator team said that the discussions between Washington and Baghdad concentrate on the tasks of the U.S forces and not on their numbers. It’s worth mentioning that Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki emphasized that the U.S side initially accepted to withdraw its forces after the end of 2011 and to pull out all the combat forces from all the cities by the middle of the next year.

Regarding the Iraqi-U.S pact (SOFA), he said “It’s not necessary to be signed before the end of the tenure of the U.S President George Bush; the important thing is to be signed in order to pave the way for more cooperation between both countries.”

http://pukmedia.com/english/index.ph...=6566&Itemid=1

Kurdistan's PM, British minister meet on hydrocarbon law

The prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) on Saturday met with the British minister of state for energy, Malcolm Wicks, and discussed with him the controversial oil and gas law.

"Today, Negervan Barazani received a British delegation led by the minister of state for energy and discussed with them the oil and gas law, a fair distribution of wealth in Iraq and recent developments in Iraq and the region as a whole," according to a statement published on the official Web site of the regional government.

The contentious hydrocarbon law would grant foreign companies exploration and production rights over 26 unproductive oil wells and the State Company for Iraqi Oil the rights over 52 productive oil wells.

Aswat Aliraq

Dollar demand lower at CBI auction

Demand for the dollar was down in the Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) auction on Sunday, registering at $ 60.660 million compared to $ 78.460 million the last session.

"The demand hit $17.420 million in cash and $ 43.240 million in foreign transfers outside the country, all covered by the bank at a stable exchange rate of 1,180 Iraqi dinars per dollar, unchanged for the sixth consecutive session," an official source from the bank told Aswat al-Iraq – Voices of Iraq – (VOI).

None of the 11 banks that participated in the session offered to sell dollars.

The Central Bank of Iraq runs a daily auction from Sunday to Thursday.

Aswat Aliraq

Opinion piece from an The National, Arabic News Digest

United Currency must go ahead

The Saudi Arabian pro-government newspaper Al Watan ran a lead editorial on Friday saying that at a time when the Gulf finance and economy ministers were meeting in Jeddah to discuss monetary union and the basic statute of the United Monetary Council, the world was witnessing one of the biggest financial crashes in decades.

“There will be a possible decrease in oil demand due to the global economic recession and the decline in prices, which might damage development in the Gulf,” the paper wrote.

The Qatari finance minister, who is currently heading the Gulf session, stated that the Gulf states’ economies were strong enough to face the global events.

Exchange rates against the dollar have started to decline, at a time when the Gulf currencies are likely to improve. “This is where the importance of the birth of the unified Gulf currency emerges, in order to reflect the Gulf economic reality that has grown completely separate from America.

It is thus important to double the efforts to agree over a unified currency and commit to the date of its launching in 2010.

http://www.thenational.ae/article/20...mplate=opinion

Wicks Pledges Energy Support for Iraq

UK Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks has today pledged the UK's support to help build Iraq's energy sector capacity, a sector that is vital to the country's economic development and reconstruction.

Mr Wicks was speaking from Iraq at the end of a two day visit, made at the invitation of Iraqi oil minister Shahristani. The visit included a meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki in Baghdad and also a visit to the Kurdish Regional Government.

Mr Wicks said:
"Iraq's energy sector is fundamental to the country's reconstruction and economic development, as well as to raising the living standards of Iraqi people.

"I have met Minister Shahristani several times and am pleased to have been able to take him up on his offer to see for myself the energy challenges facing Iraq.

"The UK is particularly focused in Iraq on capacity building and the skills they need in the energy sector. The UK as a producer nation has a long history of skills and abilities in this sector and we are offering assistance where they have requested it."

Mr Wicks also discussed the forthcoming London energy summit, to be held on 19 December, following on from the Jeddah meeting in June. The objectives for the meeting include building shared producer and consumer understanding of future supply and demand trends, and the impact of financial markets on the level and volatility of prices.

The summit will also discuss international support to help developing countries mitigate the consequences of high oil prices, as well as discussing international progress on energy efficiency. Improving the quality, completeness and timeliness of oil data will also be on the agenda.

http://7thspace.com/headlines/293376..._for_iraq.html

The importance of competitive clusters specialized .. expert calls for the establishment of economic cities

for an economist of the National Investment to expedite the establishment of cities on economic groups or industries with a competitive level in the world. According to Dr. Nabil al-Saidi, professor at the Faculty of Economy and Administration said the agency (Iba) that the importance of these cities as it will provide jobs in service industries associated with it, in addition to other functions, stressing the need for coordination with the concerned authorities to plan strategy for the development of national human resources. He said the city is known worldwide economic often linked to the field of energy industries or development of knowledge, transportation and logistics services and the implementation and development of city projects done through the private sector, where investors bear the costs of purchasing the land and all the founding utilities, infrastructure and this will lead to the establishment of the cities more quickly than If the evolution of the public sector.

He said that the economic cities pay particular attention to the use of modern technology applications that have a significant impact on the competitiveness of these cities and sectors which are in the world after the establishment of strategic partnership between the Commission and international companies.

Stressed the need to provide a competitive investment environment and all the investors in these cities economic and licensing service centers through a comprehensive implementation of all government actions in times of record based on global standards stressing countless governmental actions and development of full cooperation with all relevant government authorities.

He added that these cities Saidi industries and services will create new competitive and reduce economic dependence on oil revenues of Iraq, calling for a strategy and action plan for the establishment of a number of major industries there.

Translated version of http://www.almadapaper.com/paper.php?source=akbar&page=107