Thread: Iraq/Dinar News. 09/05 to 01/14/07

Soldiers enjoy holiday festivities in ‘Green Zone’
Tuesday, 26 December 2006


Floyd Lee, the dining facility’s senior supervisor, leads his staff in a ‘pre-serving’ cheer prior to the beginning of Christmas Day dinner at the U.S. Embassy dining facility. Photo by Sgt. Corey Strand.BAGHDAD — On Christmas Day about 146,000 Coalition troops in Iraq went to work like they do every day. However, even in the midst of war, holiday traditions survive.

On Christmas Day civilian and military personnel who live in the International Zone gathered in the U.S. Embassy dining facility to eat a traditional Christmas dinner.

The dining facility staff understands that one of the most treasured Christmas traditions is gathering with family and friends to eat dinner.

“People are away from home and loved ones, so we want to provide them with a traditional Christmas meal to make them feel a little closer to their homes and families,” said Floyd Lee, the dining facility’s senior supervisor. Lee and his staff began preparing for the Christmas feast as soon as Thanksgiving was over, he said. The feast was not the only event enjoyed in the IZ.

Although civilian and military personnel could not be home to open gifts, many of them opened presents sent from home and the presents they received from their “family” here in Baghdad.

“All during the year we work together seven days a week, and we become very close like a family,” Lee said. “So at Christmas time, we have two families, one at home, and one here.”

Soldiers also displayed their talents to spread joy and highlight the season. “We had a Christmas party with a live band made up of members of our unit. Our Family Readiness Group knitted stockings filled with Christmas goodies and sent them to us. It was a real nice touch,” said Capt. Nathan Wilder of the 101st Airborne Division.

During the holiday meal, it became evident that being deployed for Christmas had a different meaning for everyone.

Some people are old hands at dealing with Christmas deployments, said Lt. Col. Cheryl Brady, Multi-National Force-Iraq, who has been deployed to the Middle East before. “I was here Christmas of 1990 for Desert Shield. My faith helps me focus on the reason for the season,” she said.

For others, Christmas was just like any other day. “The days here blur together,” said Lance Cpl. Matt Thompson, Marine Security Force. “I didn’t realize that it was Christmas until someone told me.”

While servicemembers and civilians celebrated Christmas in Baghdad, they shared silent thoughts of their family as they prayed they would be home next Christmas.

(By Sgt. Corey Strand, Combined Press Information Center)

While servicemembers and civilians celebrated Christmas in Baghdad, they shared silent thoughts of their family as they prayed they would be home next Christmas.


That part really drives it home, I wish they were with their families all year round

Berlin, December 25, 2006

The Iraqi government is considering a new oil law that could give private oil companies greater control over its vast reserves. In light of rampant violence and shaky democratic institutions, many fear the law is being pushed through hastily by special interests behind closed doors.

Oil. The world economy's thick elixir yields politics as murky and combustible as the crude itself. And no wonder. It brings together some awkward bedfellows: It's where multinationals meet villagers, where executives meet environmentalists, where vast wealth meets deep poverty, where East meets West.

Iraq's al Dora refinery blazes after being hit by a mortar last week.
Oil, of course, can be politically explosive at the best of times, let alone the worst. So, when the country with the third largest oil reserves in the world debates the future of its endowment during a time of civil war, people sit up and take notice.

The Iraqi government is working on a new hydrocarbons law that will set the course for the country's oil sector and determine where its vast revenues will flow. The consequences for such a law in such a state are huge. Not only could it determine the future shape of the Iraqi federation -- as regional governments battle with Baghdad's central authority over rights to the riches -- but it could put much of Iraqi oil into the hands of foreign oil companies.

Political differences could still derail the legislative process. The Kurdish and Shia populations want to control their oil-rich territories without Baghdad's help. Meanwhile Sunni Arabs located in the oil-poor center of the country want the federal government to guarantee they're not excluded from the profits.

That hasn't stopped the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG), though. The KRG has already signed agreements of its own with oil companies. But Baghdad has declared the contracts invalid, and the new draft law states that Iraq's oil exploration, production and transport would be handled by the central government in Baghdad, according to excerpts of the draft published by Dow Jones Newswires.

Controversial contracts

Nevertheless, the draft law lays the ground work for private oil companies to take large stakes in Iraq's oil. The new law would allow the controversial partnerships known as 'production sharing agreements' (PSA). Oil companies favor PSAs, because they limit the risk of cost overruns while giving greater potential for profit. PSAs tend to be massive legal agreements, designed to replace a weak or missing legal framework -- which is helpful for a country like Iraq that lacks the laws needed to attract investment.

It's also dangerous. It means governments are legally committing themselves to oil deals that they've negotiated from a position of weakness. And, the contracts typically span decades. Companies argue they need long-term legal security to justify huge investments in risky countries; the current draft recommends 15 to 20 years.

Nevertheless, Iraq carries little exploratory risk -- OPEC estimates Iraq sits atop some 115 billion barrels of reserves and only a small fraction of its oil fields are in use. By signing oil deals with Iraq, oil companies could account for those reserves in their books without setting foot in the country -- that alone is enough to boost the company's stock. And, by negotiating deals while Iraq is unstable, companies could lock in a risk premium that may be much lower five or ten years from now.

Without drastic improvements in the security situation, companies are unlikely to begin operations anytime soon. "The legislation is not a golden bullet," one industry source told SPIEGEL ONLINE. Western oil companies are happy to receive Iraqi officials in their European headquarters, but are not keen to return the visit. Firms from China, Russia and India, however, are less intimidated by Iraq's precarious security situation and actively court Baghdad on its home turf.

Russia, after all, knows first hand what's at stake. They negotiated PSAs after the fall of communism, but the terms turned out to be so disadvantageous that they've taken to nationalizing the projects in question. Not unlike Iraq today, Russia then had weak governance and needed the money.

That's why some fear Iraq is setting its course too hastily and in too much secrecy. Greg Muttitt of social and environmental NGO Platform London told SPIEGEL ONLINE: "I was recently at a meeting of Iraqi MPs (members of parliament) and asked them how many of them had seen the law. Out of twenty, only one MP had seen it."

Last week, the Iraqi Labor Union Leadership suggested the same. "The Iraqi people refuse to allow the future of their oil to be decided behind closed doors," their statement reads. "(T)he occupier seeks and wishes to secure themselves energy resources at a time when the Iraqi people are seeking to determine their own future while still under conditions of occupation."

Many worry instability would only get worse if the public feels cheated by the government and multinationals -- the Iraqi constitution says the oil belongs to the Iraqi people. The Labor Union Leadership warned: "We strongly reject the privatization of our oil wealth, as well as production sharing agreements, and there is no room for discussing the matter. This is the demand of the Iraqi street, and the privatization of oil is a red line that may not be crossed."

Peter Eigen, chairman of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, a body that aims to bring improved governance in resource-rich countries, told SPIEGEL ONLINE that an open debate is crucial. "Civil society and private sector should play a role in this," he said. "If this doesn't happen, it will just be another country where the blessing of petroleum has been turned into a curse."

Why so fast?

Oil is central to Iraq's reconstruction and economic recovery, and the U.S. government is urging Iraq to develop the sector quickly. The recent Iraq Study Group report recommended the US help Iraq "prepare a draft oil law" to hasten investment. The report estimates Iraq could raise oil production from 2 million to 3 or 3.5 million barrels per day over the next three to five years.

Critics say the US is leaning on the IMF and World Bank to push Iraq into signing oil contracts fast, so western firms can secure the oil before Chinese, Indian and Russian firms do. An IMF official told SPIEGEL ONLINE that "passage of a hydrocarbon law is not a condition for financial support from the IMF." Nevertheless, Iraqi authorities found it necessary to promise the IMF a draft petroleum law by the end of this year -- this in the same letter that says "we will take whatever steps are necessary to ensure that the program remains on track."

The IMF sets the conditions for Iraq's debt relief from the so-called Paris Club countries. Eighty percent of that debt has been wiped clean, and the final 20 percent depends on certain economic reforms. With the final reduction, Iraq's debt would come to 33 percent of its GDP -- but if the reforms are not made, debt would climb to 57 percent of GDP, according to an IMF report.

Criticisms have also been levelled against the World Bank, where former US deputy defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz is in charge. Wolfowitz has been accused of pushing a US agenda after opening a World Bank office in Baghdad.

Most agree that Iraq should develop its oil -- the question is how and how fast. Apart from the law's content, Eigen stresses the drafting process must be transparent for any law to succeed: "Everything that is done behind closed doors will probably have to be renegotiated later."

Originally Posted by worf

"The stability of the currency is important but that any increase or decrease in the rate of exchange depends on several considerations imposed by the market and that the stability of the currency on a continuous basis is not in the interest of economy." And : "The reason for raising the rate of the dinar is the International Monetary Fund, which stipulated that for canceling 21 billion dollars of Iraq's debt.

This has got me scratching my head. What are they talking about? For months and even years it has always been about keeping the currency stable. Now that they have proved they can do it, we are told it is no longer in the interest of the economy? I don't know for sure but it seems like some sort of coded green light to pull out the stops and raise the rate of the dinar all head full!!!(which I hope means they are going to give as a big r/v very shortly!!!)

Happy New Year everybody,

worf

worf

Well to me it seems as if they proved they can keep the currency stable plus they have now also proved they can combat inflation with their financial mechanisms though there is more to go. Now it's time to bring it to parity with the region.







It's late in the fourth quarter, third and short yardage. Bernake takes the snap from Bremmer hands off to Shabibi. Shabibi scrambles left, A great block down field by Wolfowitz, Shabibi's dashes for the end zone touchdown!

Score: Iraq $1.20 naysayers zippiddidooodah......

Covert gardeners wage campaign to beautify Baghdad
Myrtle Beach Online

December 26, 2006

It just makes us more defiant. The flowers appear overnight, and in the unlikeliest of places: carnations near a checkpoint, roses behind razor wire, and gardenias in a square known for suicide bombings.

Sometimes, U.S. armored vehicles hop a median and mow down the myrtle, leaving Baghdad parks workers to fume and reach for their trowels. When insurgents poured kerosene over freshly planted seedlings, landscapers swore a revenge of ficus trees and olive groves.

It's all part of a stealthy campaign to turn the entire capital into a green zone.

Jaafar Hamid al Ali, the Baghdad parks supervisor, leads the offensive. He's got a multimillion-dollar budget, along with 1,500 intrepid employees and a host of formidable enemies. There's the fussy climate, salty soil and nonstop violence that killed 30 of his workers in 2006. Every fallen gardener, Ali said, is a martyr in the struggle to beautify Baghdad.

'My principle is, for every drop of Iraqi blood, we must plant something green,' he said. 'One gives disappointment, the other gives hope.'

Ali, 62, cuts a dapper figure among Iraqi bureaucrats. One recent chilly afternoon at his headquarters at Zawraa Park, the only operating park in Baghdad, he wore a knee-length hounds-tooth overcoat, a navy Yves St. Laurent jacket, and spit-shined shoes. Someone had scribbled a flower on the nameplate that hangs on his office door.

He's a French-educated former professor who can recount by memory the history of flora in Iraq. The supposed site of the fabled hanging gardens of Babylon lies just 50 miles south of where he works.

Ottoman rulers established the first official public parks, some of which remained open well into the 1920s, Ali said. In the 1930s, the Baghdad city council built a few more parks and for the next four decades worked toward a goal of allotting 160 square feet of green space for each resident. By the 1970s, they'd reached 85 square feet per person.

'Our ambition was to hit the international standard by the 1980s,' al-Ali said. 'But then came the Iraq-Iran war.'

Frequent power interruptions during the eight-year war left Baghdad residents with no way to heat their homes in the winter. Ali, by that time a high-ranking parks employee, had overseen the planting of a large forest in the Furat neighborhood. It took 12 years for the acacia, casuarina and eucalyptus to mature, he said, and just one night for locals to chop down half the forest for firewood.

'I found them still dragging the wood away,' he recalled. 'I had a stroke. I had to go straight to the hospital.'

He recovered, but Baghdad parks did not. The Gulf War in 1991 dealt a fresh blow. Ali watched with fury as Saddam Hussein rewarded his generals by issuing presidential orders that turned the people's parks into his cronies' private gardens.

By the time U.S.-led forces toppled Saddam in 2003, there were just 5 square feet of park space for each Baghdad resident. Acacias and tall date palms still lined many avenues in the capital - until insurgents began firing on U.S. troops from the brush.

Coalition forces razed acres of palm groves, Ali said, partly for security and partly to widen the passageways for their hulking armored personnel carriers. Airport Road, once one of the loveliest of thoroughfares, remains a barren ribbon of knee-high palm stumps.

'We had big hopes of restoring greenery to Baghdad right after the fall of the regime,' Ali said. 'Unfortunately, the friendly forces contributed to destroying what very little was left.'

Ali had written off parks work as futile and had become a successful businessmen and a member of the Mansour neighborhood council. Yet he couldn't shake thoughts of his boyhood home, with a courtyard in the middle.

In 2004, he succumbed to his passion, took a pay cut and signed a contract to become supervisor of Baghdad parks. The task seemed ludicrous to many Iraqis living in the throes of war, but he couldn't bear to see his city hidden behind blast walls and coils of concertina wire. The gray, bullet-scarred tableau gnaws at the soul, he said.

'This,' he declared, 'is the right time for flowers.'

Ali spent most of that first year simply refurbishing the city's nurseries, which had been destroyed by looters in the days after Saddam's ouster. He ordered seeds from Syria, and his staff performed tests to find the hardiest plants to withstand the rigors of war.

The parks' shoestring budget didn't allow for much visible improvement. But 2005 brought the serendipitous appointment of a new Baghdad City Council chairman, who happened to be an agricultural engineer. Ali had found a kindred spirit.

The budget allotment for parks was increased, and Ali immediately set his sights on Baghdad's abandoned, litter-strewn traffic squares and medians. Workers planted two million flowers, shrubs and trees in the past year, he said, exposing themselves to gunfire and car bombs in the process. Insurgents intimidated many gardeners into leaving their work; others were killed.

'The so-called resistance doesn't want cleanliness or gardens. They want Baghdad to stay like this, neglected,' Ali said. 'It just makes us more defiant.'

Still, the obstacles are myriad. At the Zawraa Park nursery, just opposite from a military recruiting center that's a favored target for bombers, workers said they frequently pick bullets and shrapnel from their fragile cuttings. Explosions have shattered the office windows three times in recent months.

For now, the fruits of the parks department's labor are visible mostly in relatively safe Shiite Muslim neighborhoods such as Karrada and Shoala. That's changing, Ali promised, with a new campaign that targets the predominantly Sunni western side of the capital known as Karkh.

Ali beamed as he recounted how parks employees have slipped into the dangerous Doura and Mansour districts armed with seeds that one day will blossom into vibrant gerbera.

'It's like stealing,' he said. 'When we see nobody is around, we run in, plant and escape. You see, when you have the will, anything is possible.'

ONGC, Reliance in parley to develop Iraq oilfield
OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
New Delhi, Dec. 26: ONGC’s overseas arm is believed to be in talks once again with Reliance Industries Ltd and Sonatrach of Argentina for joining hands to develop the Tuba oilfield in Iraq.

ONGC-Videsh (OVL), in partnership with Reliance Industries and Sonatrach, had earlier completed negotiations with the Iraqi government for a stake in the Tuba oilfield in southern Iraq. But before the deal could be signed, the Gulf war broke out, terminating all deals entered into by the Saddam regime.

Though a Reliance spokesperson declined to comment, sources said Reliance and ONGC Videsh were in talks. The consortium will see ONGC Videsh and RIL holding about 30 per cent stake each and Sonatrach the remaining 40 per cent. This will give the Indian companies the controlling stake jointly.

Petroleum minister Murli Deora is believed to have taken up this case with Iraqi oil minister Hussain Al-Shahristani earlier this year. Officials said this is different from several contracts that were in nascent stages and were later cancelled. Moreover, the size of the field is relatively small and is unlikely to interest big western companies.

The ministry of external affairs has supported the move to defend Indian interests in Iraq. The petroleum ministry had set up a special cell on Iraq-related issues headed by a joint secretary. This cell was looking into cases such as Tuba.

While the main contracts for the reconstruction of Iraq will remain in the hands of US companies such as Bechtel, Indian firms are vying for sub-contracts. Engineers India Ltd, Indian Oil, GAIL and ONGC will be looking for such sub-contracts in the oil sector. This opportunity would cover oilfields, downstream refinery ventures and pipelines that form part of essential infrastructure. Indian companies will also be looking for contracts in the power, telecom and transport sectors. Their prior experience in Iraq is expected to prove useful for the execution at the ground level.

Indian oil firms are under a mandate to seek oil equity abroad as the country is heavily dependent on imports and there are limited possibilities of shoring up domestic finds. The search for oil from overseas fields has become urgent with oil prices rising over the last year. Fears of instability in West Asia have risen once again because Iran has said it will defy UN sanctions and continue with nuclear research.

Libya block

Less aid going to Iraq refugees
By Hal Bernton

Seattle Times staff reporter

Amid the spreading violence in Iraq, the International Organization for Migration operates a low-key effort to help those who have fled their homes. Dozens of staff travel the country, providing clean water, cooking utensils, blankets and other basic supplies to displaced Iraqis.

The work doesn't grab many headlines, nor much money. But urgency grows each week as thousands of Iraqis seek safe havens.

The budget for helping refugees shrank this past year as the United States pared $9 million from a contribution that in 2005 totaled $12 million, according to an International Organization for Migration (IOM) official.

"The program has actually worked quite well — we're able to get supplies to the people," said Rafiq Tschannen, the IOM's chief of its Iraq mission. "But we really don't have enough money to meet minimal requirements."

The IOM and other international agencies are hoping for increased U.S. support next year as the Bush administration reconsiders its options in a U.S. war that now consumes an estimated $2 billion a week in taxpayer money.

Most of the focus is on shifting military and diplomatic strategies in hopes of reducing the attacks on U.S. soldiers and Iraqi civilians.

There has been much less debate about what more should be done to address the plight of civilian survivors fleeing from their homes or who may wind up in hospitals lacking the most basic drugs.

The Iraq Study Group's report released this month said relief efforts are underfunded and called for the U.S. to take the lead in stepped-up assistance to United Nations and other international agencies.

Paul Hughes, a senior program officer for the U.S. Institute of Peace, which assisted the study group, said humanitarian assistance is " best done through international groups because if it is associated with the United States, it becomes a target for insurgents."

More than 1 million Iraqis are estimated to have fled to neighboring Syria and Jordan. The United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) is trying to help them as the resources of host countries are strained.




The UNHCR had hoped to have $29 million this year to aid the refugees, but the U.S. cut its contribution from $19.9 million to $7.9 million, leaving the UNHCR with a $20 million budget.

The money falls far short of what is required to register refugees, a first step in assessing their needs and giving them legal status in a host country, according to the agency. Currently, it may take six months or more to contact and register refugees.

UNHCR also wants to help move Palestinians who have lived for three generations in Baghdad. The Palestinians are now under attack.

"What [funding] we have now is just a drop in the ocean," said Andrew Harper, UNHCR coordinator for Iraq. "There is too much focus on the violence and the daily attacks and killing. What we need is to refocus on those groups who have suffered the most."

Another problem is malnutrition.

A survey this year by the World Food Program (WFP) found acute malnutrition rates of 9 percent for children younger than 5, more than double the rate found in 2003.

WFP has been trying to get nutritional supplements to the most malnourished Iraqis. That two-year effort is about 70 percent funded, with the agency lobbying — so far unsuccessfully — for the Iraqi government to kick in as much as $40 million.

As casualties mount and many doctors join the flight to neighboring countries, the medical system is in poor shape. Some hospitals lack drugs, surgical equipment, disposable needles and other essentials, according to Dr. Eamon Al-Gobory, an IOM medical officer in Iraq.

"The operations just are not being performed like they used to," Al-Gobory said. "And sometimes a patient may make it through the operation and then die because there [are] not enough antibiotics."

Al-Gobory said one option might be for international agencies to stash a large supply of medical supplies in a warehouses in Baghdad's Green Zone, where they should be safe from theft. Then convoys could deliver the supplies to hospitals.

The Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance — part of the U.S. Agency for International Development — has been bankrolling relief efforts by international agencies throughout the post-Saddam period. The Iraq office had prepared to shut down by the end of December, according to the IOM's Tschannen, but as the situation deteriorated, USAID officials decided to keep the disaster office open.

Harry Edwards, a USAID spokesman, said the office is open, and that he had no knowledge of earlier shutdown proposals.

In Washington, international aid organizations are lobbying for new relief money from the billions of dollars that Congress will appropriate for Iraq. But they are concerned that funding instead might be pulled out of other money set aside for Sudan, Kenya and other disaster hot spots.

"It [Iraq] should not compete with other humanitarian needs, many forgotten emergencies," said Nancy Lindborg, president of Mercy Corps, which is based in Portland and Bellevue. "But Congress does not always look at it that way, and that's part of the problem."


Hal Bernton: 206-464-2581 or [email protected]


Copyright © 2006 The Seattle Times Company

Originally Posted by wciappetta

Well to me it seems as if they proved they can keep the currency stable plus they have now also proved they can combat inflation with their financial mechanisms though there is more to go. Now it's time to bring it to parity with the region.







It's late in the fourth quarter, third and short yardage. Bernake takes the snap from Bremmer hands off to Shabibi. Shabibi scrambles left, A great block down field by Wolfowitz, Shabibi's dashes for the end zone touchdown!

Score: Iraq $1.20 naysayers zippiddidooodah......

I still believe the Score could be ran up. Ward, you know they have said the "get back too" several times. So maybe the Final Score will be much more. Good Posting Today. So Good infact the rules will be Relaxed Again. Lets Just try to hit the proper Threads. But The News Thread is Relaxed a bit as of NOW.

Question! I thought they hadn't made their decision because of some sort of disagreement, does this say it's actually really done??

Tuesday, December 26, 2006 Iraqi officials agree on an oil law
(MENAFN) Sources said that an oil law was agreed upon by Iraqi officials that gives the regions the right to negotiate contracts for oil fields with foreign investors, however the final decision will be made by the central government, Iraq Directory said Sources stated that the Iraqi Prime Minister agreed on the draft law which is awaiting the political approval and the adoption of the Cabinet. The added that the law calls for the formation of a national council of oil headed either by the Prime Minister or the Deputy Prime Minister and has the right to reject deals of oilfields. Iraq is in great need for foreign investment to revive its shattered economy, which relies heavily on revenues from oil exports, especially that the country has the third largest oil reserves in the world. The law calls for the conversion of the two Iraqi oil companies, turning into a holding company that has its own production units for managing the different areas of the sector.
Copyright ©2000 MENAFN All Rights Reserved

Trade Bank of Iraq - Your Trade and Investment Partner in Iraq

Iraqi South Oil Company completes field lab



MENAFN - 25/12/2006




(MENAFN) An official at the Iraqi South Oil Company revealed that the civil engineering department in the company completed the establishing of a field laboratory for quality control at the cost of 42 million dinar on an area of 85 square meters, Iraq Directory reported.

The laboratory contains a large room used for laboratory analysis of oil wells injection in addition to a rest room for the workers and rooms for the storage of laboratory materials, according to the Director of Media in the company.

He added that the establishment of laboratory field near the oil fields shortens the time necessary for the testing process of extracting oil, as currently all laboratories function from the company's headquarters away from these fields by tens of kilometers.