A suicide bomber killed at least five police officers when he rammed a car laden with explosives` into a compound in Basrah. The attack on 13 June also left several more people injured. Suicide bombings are a favoured tactic of violent jihadi and predominantly Sunni terrorist organisations. This bracket includes groups such as the Islamic […]
Speaking to the Commission on Wartime Contracting, Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy (pictured) said that the State Department intends to spend approximately $3 billion hiring 5,100 private security contractors to serve in Iraq. The State Department has repeatedly discussed the creation of this force for after the withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Iraq, which […]
Iraq is open for business, and American companies should make an effort to invest there, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (pictured) has said, according to a report from CNN. The Secretary was addressing the Business Forum Promoting Commercial Opportunities in Iraq, which included executives from companies as far-ranging as Occidental Petroleum, JP Morgan Chase, General […]
Iraq will ask the US to keep troops in the country beyond an end-of-2011 pullout deadline, says outgoing CIA director Leon Panetta (pictured), the nominee to be the next US defence secretary. Speaking at a US Senate committee considering his nomination he said he had "every confidence that a request like that will be forthcoming", […]
Levels of violence rose in Iraq last week, although conditions were not as bad as a fortnight ago. Most incidents were concentrated in Baghdad, Anbar and Salah ad-Din provinces, with an overall decline in militant activity in the north of the country and a rise in attacks in the south. There has also been a […]
Iraq's Prime Minister, Nuri al-Maliki, has appointed Hamida al-Jaf as head of the state-owned Trade Bank of Iraq, replacing Hussein al-Uzri amid investigations into alleged corruption, the bank’s deputy director general said. “The Trade Bank of Iraq is operating normally and people have confidence in the bank,” Deputy Director General Abdel Hadi Sadeq Abdel Mahdi […]
The discovery of two fake contracts in which officials from Baghdad municipality were involved has shed new light on the extent of corruption in the country, according to a report from Azzaman. The municipality claims that two of its senior officials were involving in doctoring two $164 million contracts for the construction of sports stadiums […]
The average weekly number of attacks has risen in Iraq over the last two months. Conditions gradually worsened in the first five months of the year, and while the increase in attacks has not been dramatic, it is nonetheless still a concern, particularly as the US prepares to withdraw its military by the end of […]
Overview Readers of the weekly update will recall that the last entry detailed one of the most hostile seven days since AKE began contributing to Iraq Business News. Fortunately conditions improved over the course of last week. There was a fall (by half) in the number of bombings reported, while shootings declined as well. Kidnap […]
The New York Times reports that two American businessmen have been charged with paying army officers more than $1 million in bribes to secure multimillion-dollar contracts to supply the American military and help rebuild Iraq. A federal indictment against the men, George H. Lee, and his son, Justin W. Lee, was unsealed on Friday. Both […]
Under the auspices of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), a meeting was held yesterday, 25 May 2011, by the Standing Consultation Mechanism to advance the resolution of the Disputed Internal Boundaries issues. Attention was given to the security arrangements in the respective areas. Furthermore the participants discussed ways for expediting the holding […]
MAG (pronounced “Mag”) – Mines Advisory Group – is a neutral and impartial humanitarian organisation that clears the remnants of conflict for the benefit of communities worldwide. Since beginning work in Iraq in 1992, MAG’s programme has grown significantly, improving life for hundreds more communities throughout the north of the country. Assessments conducted by Community […]
