These are the archives for the week ending 13th July 2007
None of surge benchmarks met
The Iraqi government has not yet fully met any of 18 goals for political, military and economic reform, the Bush administration said today in an interim report certain to inflame debate in Congress over growing calls for a U.S. troop withdrawal.
The report said that despite progress on some fronts by the government of Nouri al-Maliki, "the security situation in Iraq remains complex and extremely challenging," the "economic picture is uneven" and political reconciliation is lagging.
Houston Chronicle, 12/7/07
429 civilians killed at US checkpoints in last year
U.S. soldiers have killed or wounded 429 Iraqi civilians at checkpoints or near patrols and convoys during the past year, according to military statistics compiled in Iraq.
The statistics are the first official accounting of civilian shootings since the war began, and while they seem small compared with the thousands who've died in Iraq's violence, they show the difficulty that the U.S. has in fulfilling its vow to protect civilians.
The numbers cover what the military calls escalation-of-force incidents, in which American troops fire at civilians who've come too close or have approached checkpoints too quickly.
In the months since U.S. commanders have dispatched more troops to the field -- ostensibly to secure Iraqi communities -- the number of Iraqis killed and injured in such incidents has spiked, the statistics show.
Central Daily Times, Pennsylvania, 12/7/07
Former sunni MP sentenced for corruption
An Iraqi court has convicted a fugitive former Sunni Arab member of parliament of corruption, and sentenced him to 15 years in prison.
Mishaan al-Jubouri was found guilty of embezzling millions of dollars from funds allocated for the protection of Iraq's oil industry.
His son, Yezin, was also convicted and received a similar sentence. Both men were sentenced in their absence after apparently fleeing from Iraq to Syria.
BBC News, 11/7/07
Two killed and seven children wounded
At least two people were killed and seven children wounded when a US helicopter opened fire after coming under attack in the northern city of Mosul on Wednesday.
The US military said one of its helicopters received "small arms fire from the ground and defended itself" while flying near Mosul.
"Forces on the ground responding to the area reported that two people were killed in the exchange and seven children were wounded," it said.
AFP, 11/7/07
Green zone shelling kills 3
At least 20 mortar rounds and Katyusha rockets struck the fortified Green Zone on Tuesday afternoon, killing an American service member and two other people in an attack on the heart of U.S. and Iraqi government facilities in the capital.
About 18 people were injured, including two U.S. military personnel and three American contract employees, the statement said.
A U.S. Embassy spokesman said he could not confirm whether the embassy was a target, and that the frequent attacks on the Green Zone are not a barometer of the security situation in the capital.
"There's fire into the Green Zone virtually every day, so I can't draw any conclusions about the security situation based on that," he said.
Los Angeles Times, 10/7/07
US opposition to war increases
A new poll shows opposition to the Iraq war at its highest level ever in the United States, as the Senate debates military spending priorities this week.
The poll shows that more than 70 percent of Americans favor removing nearly all U.S. troops from Iraq by April. Only one in five (20 percent) said the increase in U.S. forces in Iraq since January has made any difference.
The poll also showed President Bush's approval rating has dropped to 29 percent, down from 33 percent in early June.
Voice of America, 10/7/07
Iraqis turning surge into 'a joke'
President Bush is not contemplating withdrawing forces from Iraq now despite an erosion of support among Republicans for his war policy, the White House said Monday.
However, a senior administration official who has been to Iraq many times tells CBS News the Iraqis have made the surge "a joke," adding that they lack the ability, the firepower and the discipline to take over anything.
CBS News, 11/7/07
Iraq war could take decades
The head of US forces in Iraq, General David Petraeus, has told the BBC that fighting the insurgency is a "long term endeavour" which could take decades.
Gen Petraeus was keen to emphasise that the ongoing unrest in Iraq is not something he expects to be resolved overnight. "Northern Ireland, I think, taught you that very well. My counterparts in your [British] forces really understand this kind of operation... It took a long time, decades," he said
"I don't know whether this will be decades, but the average counter insurgency is somewhere around a nine or a 10 year endeavour."
BBC News, 9/7/07
Wars costing US $12 billion a month...
The United States has shelled out well over half a trillion dollars on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and running costs have hit $12 billion a month, according to an independent report.
New figures by the non-partisan Congressional Research Service (CRS) emerged as debate hit a critical point in Washington over the huge human and financial costs of the four-year conflict in Iraq.
The report also provided a glimpse into the astronomical costs of US military operations in years to come - saying the global war on terror could have churned through a stunning $1.4 trillion by 2017.
Times of India, 10/7/07
...but UK costs are a secret
The government has been severely criticised by a group of MPs for not outlining the costs of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and for spending in the current year without parliamentary approval.
The House of Commons defence select committee said it was 'entirely unacceptable' that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) refused to show all its estimated annual spending at the start of the financial year as other departments are required to.
The MoD asked for £33.7 billion for the current year, but this does not include the expected costs of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and 'so greatly underestimates the total expected cost of the MoD's activities in 2007-08', the all-party committee said.
Operations in the two war zones were forecast to exceed £1.7 billion last year, it added.
Thomson Financial, 9/7/07
Preparing for withdrawal
The US invasion that promised Iraqis freedom has deprived them of their security, smashed their state and fragmented their country into a lawless archipelago ruled by militias, jihadis, ethnic cleansers, bandits and kidnappers.
The continuing US military presence shows no sign of being able to resolve this. The so-called "surge" of troop reinforcements, like everything else Washington has tried in Iraq, is far too little, much too late.
What the US occupation has done, however, is to infantilise Iraq's public life, encouraging its leaders to believe they can continue to play sectarian, winner-takes-all politics while American forces prevent a descent into total anarchy.
Would a US withdrawal bring Iraq's politicians to their senses, forcing them to sek ways of living together and rebuilding their country and institutions? There is no guarantee of that. But the democratic process in the US does pretty much guarantee that the troops will be brought home. It is time to start preparing for that and to use it as leverage in Iraq and the region.
Financial Times, 9/7/07
US officials moving goalposts
The Iraqi government is unlikely to meet any of the political and security goals President Bush set for it in January when he announced a major shift in US policy, according to senior administration officials closely involved in the matter.
As they prepare an interim report due by July 15, officials are marshaling alternative evidence of progress to persuade Congress to continue supporting the war.
In a preview of the assessment it must deliver to Congress in September, the administration will report that Sunni tribal leaders in Anbar Province are turning against the group Al Qaeda in Iraq in growing numbers; that sectarian killings were down in June; and that Iraqi political leaders managed last month to agree on a unified response to the bombing of a major religious shrine, officials said.
Those achievements are markedly different from the benchmarks Bush set when he announced his decision to send tens of thousands of additional troops to Iraq.
Washington Post, 9/7/07
Maliki losing support
Iraqi Shia leaders linked to the radical cleric, Moqtada Sadr, have attacked their former government ally, Prime Minister Nouri Maliki. They accused Mr Maliki of bowing to US demands and sanctioning US attacks on Mr Sadr's Mehdi Army militia.
Dozens of people have died in recent fighting between Iraqi forces and Mehdi Army militiamen, amid signs of a growing rift between the Shia groups.
On Saturday, Mr Maliki said the Mehdi Army had been infiltrated by criminals and by members of the Baath Party of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Mr Sadr's supporters said Mr Maliki's comments effectively gave US forces a "green light" to attack the Mehdi Army militia.
BBC News, 8/7/07
US troops to use Afghan currency
US troops deployed in Afghanistan will conduct all business in afghani in an effort to stabilise the Afghan currency. US troops currently use US dollars for business transactions.
Noorullah Dilawari, head of Afghanistan's central bank, said that an amount of $40 million was going to Afghan businessmen from the US forces' budget every month.
The dollars would now be transferred into afghanis through the central bank and would be paid in local currency to the US troops, he said. The method would help the central bank better
The Economic Times, India, 8/7/07
Press pressure for US withdrawal builds
At a critical moment, with Republicans in Congress starting to abandon President Bush on Iraq, The New York Times for its Sunday edition has published what may one day be viewed as a historic editorial.
It is titled, "The Road Home," and opens: "It is time for the United States to leave Iraq, without any more delay than the Pentagon needs to organize an orderly exit."
As long chronicled by E&P, very few newspapers in the U.S. have endorsed a withdrawal from Iraq or even a timetable for that, despite the overwhelming shift in public opinion on that question.
Momentum has started to shift in that direction, however, with a handful of papers -- from the Los Angeles Times to, just this week, The Olympian in Washington -- backing a pullout. Now the Times has added its considerable weight to this cause.
Editor and Publisher, 7/7/07
Car bomb kills 150 in Iraq
The death toll from Saturday's truck bomb attack in a market in the northern Iraqi town of Tuz Khurmato may be as high as 150, local officials said on Sunday. Local mayor, Mohammed Rasheed, said the truck bomb destroyed about 50 small shops and 50 houses in the largely Shi'ite Muslim town.
A death toll of 150 would make it one of the single deadliest insurgent bombings in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Iraqi officials have blamed Sunni Islamist al Qaeda for the attack.
The bombing was a blow to a U.S.-backed security crackdown in Iraq and underscored the ability of militants to stage large-scale attacks despite the arrival of nearly 30,000 additional U.S. troops. U.S. officials blame most big car bombings on al Qaeda, which they say is trying to spark full-scale civil war between Iraq's majority Shi'ites and minority Sunni Arabs.
Reuters, 8/7/07
Brown affirms support for Afghan war
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown pledged continued commitment and involvement in Afghanistan during a telephone conversation with President Hamid Karzai, the president's office said in a statement on Saturday.
Brown, who replaced Tony Blair as the head of the British government last week, told Karzai during their conversation that the ''security in Afghanistan means security for the world,'' the statement from Karzai's office said.
NDTV, India, 8/7/07
Marines face new probe over deaths
UP to 10 US Marines are under investigation for the deaths of eight Iraqi prisoners during the November 2004 battle for Fallujah, marking the third war crimes probe of Marines at California's Camp Pendleton, a government spokesman has said.
Ed Buice, a spokesman for the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, said he could not disclose details of the inquiry at the US Marine Corps base. But he said none of the Marines under investigation are being held in detention.
The allegation is another embarrassment for the US military fighting in Iraq and Camp Pendleton, one the Marine Corps' largest installations in the United States.
In June 2006, seven Marines and a US Navy corpsman were charged in the April 2006 killing of a 52-year-old grandfather in Hamdania, Iraq.
In December 2006, eight Marines from the same platoon being investigated in the Fallujah killings were charged in the November 2005 killings of 24 residents of Haditha, Iraq.
The latest investigation began after a Marine admitted during a polygraph test for a job with the US Secret Service that he participated in a wrongful death.
The Australian, 6/7/07
Americans kill al Qaeda leader twice
The U.S. command in Baghdad this week ballyhooed the killing of a key al Qaeda leader but later admitted that the military had declared him dead a year ago.
The incident shows the eagerness of the command to show progress in dismantling al Qaeda at a time when Democrats and some Republicans are pressing President Bush to withdraw troops from Iraq.
Brig. Gen. Kevin Bergner began his Monday news conference with a list of top insurgents either killed or captured in recent operations. He said they had been eliminated "in the past few weeks" and were "recent results."
"In the north, Iraqi army and coalition forces continue successful operations in Mosul," he told reporters. "Kamal Jalil Uthman, also known as Said Hamza, was the al Qaeda in Iraq military emir of Mosul. He planned, coordinated and facilitated suicide bombings, and he facilitated the movement of more than a hundred foreign fighters through safe houses in the area."
All told, Bergner devoted 68 words to Uthman's demise. Uthman was indeed a big kill, and the military featured his death last year in a report titled "Tearing Down al Qaeda."
National Examiner, 6/7/07
Bush losing republican support for war
Support among Republicans for President Bush's Iraq policy eroded further on Thursday as another senior lawmaker, Senator Pete V. Domenici of New Mexico, broke with the White House just as Congressional Democrats prepared to renew their challenge to the war.
"We cannot continue asking our troops to sacrifice indefinitely while the Iraqi government is not making measurable progress," said Mr. Domenici, a six-term senator who has been a steadfast supporter of the president.
Thus Mr. Domenici joined a growing number of Republican voices in opposition to the war just as Senate Democratic leaders are readying plans to put the political and policy focus back on Iraq next week.
New York Times, 5/7/07