These are the archives for the week ending 19th October 2007
'No to Turkey'
Thousands of Kurds and their supporters poured into the streets of northern Iraqi cities on Thursday to protest the Turkish parliament's approval of cross-border raids into Iraq.
Some 10,000 demonstrators in Irbil, the capital of the Kurdish regional government, carried banners and signs and shouted "no to Turkey."
In Duhuk, another mainly Kurdish city in northern Iraq, 5,000 demonstrators marched to the U.N. offices. They presented a document asking the United Nations to stop Turkey from taking any military action in Iraq, the AP reported.
Turkey's parliament on Wednesday voted to authorize cross-border actions by the country's military into Iraq to attack separatists from the Kurdistan Workers Party, known as the PKK.
CNN 18/10/07
Oil prices rise
Oil prices rose as Turkish geopolitical tensions in Iraq sparked fears supply might be hit in the world's third biggest producer.
Iraq's regional Kurdish government called today for direct talks with Ankara after the Turkish parliament yesterday authorised a military incursion into its Northern territory to crack down on rebel fighters.
Yesterday's announcement sent prices to unprecedented highs. New York prices struck 89 usd a barrel yesterday afternoon and London's Brent rallied to 84.43 usd, its highest ever level.
Oil players worry Iraq's 115 bln barrels of crude oil reserves could be hit amid volatile political tensions. However, any Turkish army operations against Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq are likely to be low-level raids yielding more psychological benefits than military ones, Turkish analysts said.
Forbes 18/10/07
Blackwater expected to leave Iraq
Blackwater USA, whose security forces were involved in the fatal shooting of civilians in Iraq last month, will leave the country once its contract to escort US diplomats expires in May, US officials say.
But the company will not be fired, the officials said following a state department review of private firms providing such services in Iraq.
Although Blackwater would not be fired outright or even "eased out", it is likely the company would not compete to keep the Iraq job.
The move comes as Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, pressed the US for Blackwater's early exit despite a six-month deadline he had set earlier.
Blackwater is the biggest security company in the war zone with more guards and equipment than both its biggest competitors combined. The three contractors share a $571m annual contract to protect diplomats and others in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel and other countries. The Iraq portion accounts for about $520m.
Al Jazeera 18/10/07
Iraq contracts with Iran and China
Iraq has agreed to award $1.1 billion in contracts to Iranian and Chinese companies to build a pair of enormous power plants.
Word of the project prompted serious concerns among American military officials, who fear that Iranian commercial investments can mask military activities at a time of heightened tension with Iran.
The Iraqi electricity minister, Karim Wahid, said that the Iranian project would be built in Sadr City, a Shiite enclave in Baghdad that is controlled by followers of the anti-American cleric Moktada al-Sadr.
He added that Iran had also agreed to provide cheap electricity from its own grid to southern Iraq, and to build a large power plant essentially free of charge in an area between the two southern Shiite holy cities of Karbala and Najaf.
The agreements between Iraq and Iran come after the American-led reconstruction effort, which relied heavily on large American contractors, has spent nearly $5 billion of United States taxpayer money on Iraq's electricity grid. Aside from a few isolated bright spots, there was little clear impact in a nation where in many places electricity is still available only for a few hours each day.
Because the power plants are in largely Shiite-controlled areas, it is possible they may not face the same sectarian violence that crippled so many American rebuilding projects.
New York Times 18/10/07
Hilary Clinton hawkish on Iran
Hillary Clinton accused Iran of trying to build an atomic bomb and said that as US president she would not rule out a military strike to end Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
Mrs Clinton said that Iran must not be allowed to build or acquire nuclear weapons. If Tehran did not bow to the demands of the international community, she said, "all options must remain on the table", the precise words used by President Bush when asked about the possibility of military action.
Mrs Clinton said that unlike Mr Bush she would seek direct talks with Tehran. But she sounded a strikingly hawkish note on Iran as she laid out the foreign policy that she would pursue if elected president - a prescription of muscular US multilateralism.
Times on line 16/10/07
Turkey plays down possibility of attack
Turkey today played down the possibility of an early attack on Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq as Baghdad sent its vice-president to Ankara for urgent talks.
Amid warnings that Turkish military action could exacerbate what is already the Middle East's worst refugee crisis since the 1940s, the Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said a parliamentary green light did not necessarily mean that a military incursion was imminent.
The Turkish parliament is expected to agree tomorrow to Mr Erdogan's request for possible cross-border offensives into the semi-autonomous, oil-rich Kurdish region of Iraq.
The prospect of military action by Nato's second-largest army helped push crude prices to a record high of over £43 ($88) a barrel today.
"I sincerely wish that this motion will never be applied. Passage of this motion does not mean an immediate incursion will follow, but we will act at the right time and under the right conditions," Mr Erdogan told his ruling Justice and Development (AK) party in a speech. "This is about self-defence."
The UN fears a Turkish cross-border offensive against Kurdish rebels could force thousands more people to flee northern Iraq.
Guardian 16/10/07
Security firm recruiters deported from Namibia
Authorities have ordered the deportation of two Americans working for a security firm that was trying to recruit Namibians to work as guards at U.S. facilities in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Namibian Cabinet also recommended the closure of the local branch of the Nevada-based security firm, Special Operations Consulting-Security Management Group (SOC-SMG), which was set up earlier this month.
Some U.S. lawmakers have said the government relies too heavily on private contractors who fall outside the military courts martial system. Many of the contractors working in Iraq are also third-country nationals.
Triple Canopy, a security company that has State Department contracts, has scores of Peruvian guards working checkpoints in the Green Zone. According to SOC-SMG's Web site, the firm's clients include the U.S. departments of defense, state and energy, as well as the U.S. Army, Air Force, Marines and Naval special forces.
The firm had been targeting Namibians over the age of 25 as well as veterans of Namibia's lengthy war with South Africa for independence. The company is reported to have held meetings with some increasingly disaffected war veterans, who have been campaigning for hefty pensions and gratuities from the state for their roles in the guerrilla war.
A sparsely populated desert country, Namibia presents an easy option for companies hoping to operate under the legal radar. The country also presents an alternative to neighbouring South Africa, where controversial anti-mercenary legislation has been introduced which will clamp down on citizens wanting to work in security and military sectors abroad.
An estimated 2,000 to 4,000 South Africans worked in Iraq last year, helping guard oil installations, hotels and foreign residents. Thousands more are in other countries like Nigeria and Afghanistan. Many of them are white former members of the apartheid-era armed forces.
AP 14/10/07
Influx of military contractors in Afghanistan
Large numbers of US private military personnel are expected to arrive in Helmand, the focal point of British involvement in Afghanistan, as part of a new effort to promote reconstruction and development in the war-torn province.
The US has contributed the largest sum to the new aid effort, over $200m. But British officials striving to win "hearts and minds" in the conflict against the Taliban have expressed concern over the potential influx of military contractors, amid a continuing furore over the shooting of civilians in Iraq by Blackwater.
A recent meeting of donors decided that the security situation in Helmand was now stable enough to start bigger aid projects. But there are recurring complaints, including among some USAID workers, that a substantial proportion of American aid money is siphoned off for security. The US government spends, on average, just over $1m a year to protect each aid worker it sends to Afghanistan.
DynCorp, one of the main American security companies, has already sown resentment in Helmand with its participation in the campaign to eradicate the opium poppy crop. The government of President Hamid Karzai, like its counterpart in Iraq, has expressed concern about the activities of private contractors and is discussing new legislation to tighten control.
Blackwater provides security for the US embassy in Kabul, but the largest American government contract in the country is believed to be held by Texas-based USPI. According to reports in its home state last week, the company has been accused of overbilling the US government by millions of dollars for non-existent employees and vehicles.
USPI acknowledges that it is being investigated, but insists that the allegations are untrue. USPI's hiring practices in Afghanistan have drawn criticism from the International Crisis Group, a think tank. It said in a report that a majority of the men on USPI's payroll were associated with private militias. "Many have used their authority to engage in criminal activity, including drug trafficking," it claimed.
Independent 15/10/07
Top US general criticises Iraq War
A retired general who led US forces in Iraq at the start of the insurgency has indicated that he may name and shame the individuals in the Bush administration he blames for a "catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic war plan".
Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez has delivered one of the most damning assessments of US policy in Iraq, becoming the most senior war commander to do so."There is no question that America is living a nightmare with no end in sight," he told reporters in Arlington, Virginia.
Even without naming names, Gen Sanchez's analysis of the mishandling of the occupation of Iraq, delivered on Friday, was piercing.
"From a catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic war plan to the administration's latest surge strategy, this administration has failed to employ and synchronise its political, economic and military power," he said.
Guardian Unltd 15/10/07
US warns of disaster if Turks attack Iraq
American officials have begun an intense lobbying effort to defuse Turkish threats to launch a military attack on Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq.
Turkey is also threatening to limit access to critical air and land routes that have become a lifeline for US troops in Iraq. But even as the US Assistant Secretary of State for European affairs, Daniel Fried, appealed for restraint in Ankara on Saturday, the Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, at a political rally in Istanbul, urged the parliament to vote unanimously this week to "declare a mobilisation" against Kurdish rebels and their "terrorist organisation", the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
US military officials predict disastrous consequences if Turkey strikes at northern Iraq and serious repercussions for the safety of US troops if Turkey reduces the supply lines it permits.
15/10/07 Washington Post
Congress must approve US attack on Iran
President George W. Bush must seek congressional approval before taking any military action in Iran, unless Tehran attacks the United States first, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Sunday.
"We don't believe that any authorities that the president has would give him the ability to go in without an act of Congress," Pelosi told ABC's "This Week" program.
"Any president, if we are attacked, if our country is attacked has - even under the War Powers Act - very strong powers to go after that country. But short of that, he must come to the Congress," said the top Democrat in the House of Representatives.
Pelosi said Bush had not requested any congressional authority to take military action in Iran, despite growing U.S. concern over Iran's nuclear ambitions and its support for militant groups in Lebanon and Gaza.
Republican presidential candidates last week said it may be necessary to attack Iran's nuclear facilities to prevent it from developing a bomb, but they were cautious about a preemptive strike, saying Congress should be consulted first.
Bush this month said the United States was working to resolve the nuclear standoff with Iran diplomatically but was keeping all its options open.
Reuters 14/10/07