Mueller witness "Helped Broker" $4.2bn Iraq-Russia Arms Deal
Posted on 11 March 2018 .
By Laura Rozen for Al-Monitor. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News.
The dealmaker: Mueller witness helped broker $4.2 billion Iraq-Russia arms deal
A Lebanese-American businessman reported to be cooperating with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe helped broker a controversial 2012 Iraq-Russia arms deal valued at $4.2 billion, Iraqi sources tell Al-Monitor.
The Russia arms deal
George Nader, 58, traveled to Moscow in 2012, telling Russian interlocutors that he represented Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the deal should be negotiated through him, according to two Iraqi sources. Nader’s role in the deal was controversial to Iraqi officials because Iraq’s minister of defense was in Russia to conduct the negotiations, and they were unaware that Maliki was working with Nader to bypass official channels.
One of the Iraqi sources, a former Iraqi official who spoke to Al-Monitor on condition that he not be named, personally witnessed Nader’s interactions with Maliki in their Moscow hotel when he accompanied Maliki to Moscow in October 2012 to sign the arms deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Nader’s career as a deal broker in Iraq ran from the mid-2000s until Maliki left office in 2014, the Iraqi sources said. Nader then became an adviser to the powerful Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. It is in that capacity that Nader’s meetings with members of the incoming Donald Trump administration in 2016-2017 — including Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, former national security adviser Michael Flynn and former chief strategist Steve Bannon — brought Nader to Mueller’s attention.
The New York Times reported Tuesday that Nader was arrested and questioned by the FBI when he landed at Washington Dulles International Airport on Jan. 17 en route to celebrate Trump’s first year in office at Mar-a-Lago in Florida. He was questioned by Mueller’s grand jury March 2 and is reported to now be cooperating with Mueller’s probe.
One line of inquiry Mueller is reported to be questioning Nader about is whether the United Arab Emirates (UAE) might have funneled money to members of the incoming Trump administration in an effort to curry influence with them, including in their dispute with Qatar.
From journalist to deal-maker
Nader’s recent career as a Middle East deal broker is both an outgrowth and departure from his past. As an editor of Middle East Insight magazine in Washington in the 1980s and 1990s, Nader interviewed President Bill Clinton and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
During this time, Nader also served as a frequent go-between in informal Syrian-Israeli talks encouraged by the Clinton administration before abruptly disappearing from the Washington scene around 2000.
“He was a reliable go-between, a facilitator,” Martin Indyk, who knew Nader when Indyk served as Clinton’s assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs and ambassador to Israel in the 1990s, told Al-Monitor. “He was not a con man.”
Nader was connected to the Hafez al-Assad regime through then-Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa and then-Syrian Ambassador to the US and current Foreign Minister Walid Moallem, Indyk said. “He was going to Israel from time to time. He set up an interview of [Syrian Foreign Minister al-Sharaa] with Israeli journalist Ehud Yaari as a confidence-building measure. George is the one that made that happen. … Then he hooked up with [Ron] Lauder. He traveled with Lauder 16 times to Damascus in 1998” in efforts to advance an Israeli-Syrian peace agreement.
“And then when the Clinton administration was gone, George was gone,” Indyk, now executive vice president of the Brookings Institution, said.
“Last time I heard from [Nader] was after the US invasion of Iraq,” journalist Hisham Melham told Al-Monitor. “He called me from Kurdistan. But why would MBZ [the crown prince] need him when he has [UAE Ambassador] Yousef Al Otaiba?”
From dabbling in Syria-Israel peace talks to Iraq postwar dealmaker
Nader appeared in Iraq in the mid-2000s, looking to translate his Rolodex of connections from his Middle East Insight days into work advising various Iraqi political clients, including some of Iraq’s new Shiite political leaders, as well as Kurdish officials.
According to Iraqi sources, Nader helped arrange meetings for the 2005 visit to Washington of leading members of an Iraqi Shiite political party with close ties to Iran, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. In 2010, Nader similarly arranged meetings for then-Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani with high-level UAE officials, including the crown prince, a second Iraqi source now living in exile told Al-Monitor. But Nader failed to win over the KRG leader, the second Iraqi source said.
“Nader got Nechirvan Barzani meetings with MBZ and [Lebanese Prime Minister] Saad Hariri,” the second Iraqi source said, adding that he advised Iraqi Kurdish interlocutors at the time to be wary of Nader.
Nader had a “knack for claiming that he had unique access to 'mysterious' persons,” the second Iraqi source said. “This way he would be able to latch on from one new confidant to another.”
By 2012, Nader had forged close ties with the Iraqi prime minister and Maliki’s son and deputy chief of staff, Ahmed Maliki, Iraqi sources said. Nader had worked with the younger Maliki on power generation projects, the former Iraqi official said. The relationship that Nader forged with Maliki’s son apparently brought Nader into the father’s inner circle when the huge Russian arms deal was being negotiated.
In August 2012, Iraq’s Minister of Defense Saadoun al-Dulaimi spent 24 days in Moscow to finalize negotiations for the $4.2 billion Russian arms deal. But during the negotiations, the former Iraqi official told Al-Monitor that he received a message from former Russian Energy Minister Yuri Shafranik warning him that there were other people in Moscow claiming that they, and not the defense minister, were representing Maliki, and that the deal should go through them.
Eventually, on Oct. 3, 2012, Shafranik went to Baghdad to try to clarify the situation with Maliki, the former Iraqi official said. Shafranik even offered Maliki a direct communication line with Russian President Vladimir Putin to avoid confusion and leaks.
“The third of October, Yuri [Shafranik] came to Baghdad, met the prime minister and told him clearly that ‘Mr. Putin is suggesting direct relations between you and him to avoid any leakage and … cut any unhealthy things,’” the former Iraqi official said. “The prime minister welcomed that.”
Maliki assured the officials that he welcomed the suggestion to streamline their contacts and signaled that the confusion over who represented Baghdad in the arms deal would be resolved.
So the former Iraqi official was astonished when he accompanied Maliki to Moscow in October 2012 to sign the Russian arms deal to see Nader enter their hotel and take the elevator to Maliki’s suite.
“We were in a Radisson hotel in Moscow,” the former Iraqi official said. “And all of a sudden, George Nader came, walking very fast, entered the elevator, went up and, I saw from the screen over the elevator, went to the level where the prime minister was staying.
“When the minister of defense came down to the ground floor, I asked, did you notice George Nader? And he said yes; he saw him entering the prime minister’s suite,” the former Iraqi official said. “By that time I realized the issue is in-house. The corrupted party, which went to Moscow to represent Maliki, they are not … strange people. They are in the circle with Maliki.”
The former Iraqi official continued, “Also, while we were there we discovered new facts. I myself did not know that those people who traveled to Moscow at the end of August, that they are connected to Maliki and his son. But George Nader I knew very well. I was shocked. Then it immediately came to me — Nader’s relations with the son of Maliki.”
Over the course of the trip to Moscow, “we came to know that one of the three people who had been in Moscow presenting themselves as [Maliki’s] representative was George Nader,” the former Iraqi official said.
A call Wednesday by Al-Monitor to an attorney who represented Nader in an earlier case was not returned. A spokesman for the Iraqi Embassy said it did not have information on the matter.
The Iraqi-Russian arms deal was controversial in Iraq and long suspected to have involved corruption. In November 2012, just a month after it was signed, Iraq’s then-acting Defense Minister Dulaimi announced that the deal was canceled, “citing possible corruption in the contract,” Reuters reported.
But Maliki’s then-media adviser Ali al-Moussawi was cited by Reuters as saying that the deals would be renegotiated and any suspension of the contract was “a precautionary measure because of suspected corruption."
From Iraq to the UAE
After the end of Maliki’s run as Iraq's prime minister in 2014, Nader made his way to become an adviser to the Abu Dhabi crown prince. Until Trump’s election, however, he had maintained such a low profile that even several Washington consultants who have advised the Emirates said they were entirely unaware of his role.
It may now be left to Mueller to help deepen understanding of Nader’s mysterious activities and what role they may have played in influencing the Trump administration’s policies toward the Middle East.
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Progress To Defeat ISIS Continues
Posted on 14 February 2018 .
Significant progress in the fight to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria has resulted in a shift in focus to sustaining military gains in Iraq to ensure a lasting defeat of Islamic State of Iraq and Syria terrorists, The commander of U.S. Air Forces Central Command told Pentagon reporters today.
An Air Force C-17 Globemaster III transport jet assigned to the 816th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron sits on the ramp at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, Jan. 24, 2018. The C-17 is capable of rapid strategic delivery of troops and all types of cargo to bases throughout the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt Gregory Brook
Speaking via teleconference from the Combined Air Operations Center at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, Air Force Lt. Gen. Jeffrey L. Harrigian said the Feb. 1 standup of a coalition aviation advisory and training team is an example of the transition.
The coalition team of airmen will help the Iraqis build a capable, affordable, professional and sustainable aviation enterprise, he explained. And while the standup of the team does not signal an increase in the U.S.-led coalition’s presence in Iraq, the CAAT will bridge the work toward standing up an air expeditionary wing that will take over that mission, he said.
Preventing ISIS Resurgence
The coalition’s train, advise and assist efforts to build a lasting Iraqi aviation enterprise will not be tied to a timeline, but instead will be conditions-based, proportional to the needs, and in coordination with partners in the Iraq government, Harrigian said.
“As we transition our focus in [Operation Inherent Resolve] to sustain our military gains, let me be clear that we will retain the necessary amount of air power to prevent a resurgence of ISIS,” he emphasized.
Harrigian said the progress to defeat ISIS has allowed the United States to realign some of its deployed combat air power and personnel to Afghanistan, including A-10 Thunderbolt II aircraft, MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aircraft and HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopters.
“These aircraft will provide increased air support to the South Asia strategy, as well as ongoing counterterrorism efforts in Afghan-led operations,” the commander said. “This plus-up in air power is also producing tangible results as part of a deliberate air campaign that we kicked off in late November to decimate the Taliban's primary revenue source -- narcotics production.”
Goal: Choke Off Taliban
The goal is to choke off the Taliban’s ability to pay for its deadly attacks, such as those in Kabul recently, he noted.
Harrigian said the campaign to stop the Taliban’s resource flow will take time and that it will not align with the traditional fighting season in Afghanistan.
“Instead, [the campaign] will be relentless and persistent, as demonstrated by the 321 precision munitions we released this January against Taliban targets in the dead of winter, a time they typically rest and recuperate,” he said.
Such pressure will persist until the Taliban reconcile or die, Harrigian said. “We are already seeing positive reflections from our intelligence that the Taliban are not enjoying their typical winter break.”
(Source: US Dept of Defense)
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Asiacell Revenues Up
Posted on 13 February 2018 .
By John Lee.
Qatar-based Ooredoo has announced that revenue at its Asiacell subsidiary in Iraq increased 6 percent to QAR 4.5 billion, while and EBITDA increased 3 percent to QAR 2.0 billion, for the year ended 31th December 2017.
EBITDA margin was put at 44 percent.
In a statement, the company said:
"A key opportunity in 2017 was restoring our network sites in the liberated areas and helping customers living there to reconnect to our services.
"As a result, Asiacell increased customer numbers by 8% to reach almost 13 million as network recovery advanced in the liberated areas in the north and west of the country."
(Source: Ooredoo)
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NIDC Eyes Iraqi Drilling Market
Posted on 27 January 2018 .
The National Iranian Drilling Company (NIDC) is planning to participate in neighboring Iraq‘s drilling tenders.
Speaking to reported on the sidelines of an oil show in Kish Island, on Tuesday, Sepehr Sepehri, NIDC managing director, said the company’s approach is to secure itself a toehold in global markets, adding NIDC is planning to participate in international drilling tenders in Iraq.
“We have plans to join drilling projects in neighboring countries and we have started correspondences with Iraq in this regard,” the official said.
Sepehri said the two country’s access to Arvand Free Zone, favorable crude oil production capacity in Iraq’s Basra and the good terms the two neighbors are on are among the advantages of working in Iraq.
He further said that NIDC will take part in three drilling tenders that Italy’s ENI is planning to hold in Iraq.
The NIDC official added that Oman is another market the company is seeing to gain a foothold in.
“We have indicated readiness to offer services to Oman, too, and will consider the matter in more depth during a visit by an Omani delegation to Iran within the next few weeks.”
Besides drilling operations, NIDC enjoys massive potentialities in offering drilling services, the CEO added.
“After Iraq and Oman, we are targeting operations in Qatar,” Sepehri added.
(Source: Shana)
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Kuwait Gas-Supply Pact -- Iraq "has Much to Gain"
Posted on 09 January 2018 .
By Salam Zidane for Al Monitor. Any views expressed here are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News.
Iraq has much to gain from gas-supply pact with Kuwait
Kuwait will begin importing natural gas from neighboring Iraq this year, a development welcomed in Baghdad as it could improve Iraq's relations with the Gulf countries — relations that ruptured when Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990.
Most of Iraq’s gas is associated petroleum gas, also known as flare gas. Associated petroleum gas is a byproduct of oil production, as opposed to natural gas that comes directly from gas reservoirs in the ground.
The Iraqi Ministry of Oil has decided to export associated petroleum gas from international oil companies operating in southern Iraq to Kuwait via a gas pipeline near Basra. Kuwait would then turn it into dry gas, condensates and liquid gas, among other types. According to the Ministry of Oil, Iraq flares 1.5 billion cubic feet of gas daily.
Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad told Al-Monitor, “Iraq will export to Kuwait the associated gas, part of which is flared on a daily basis. Processing natural gas is a complex and expensive industrial process that requires building plants through local and foreign companies.”
Jihad said, “Iraq is set to supply Kuwait with 50 million cubic feet of gas daily, which will gradually increase to 200 million cubic feet [depending on] international prices. The gas will be exported through the three-decade-old pipeline linking the two countries. The pipeline, however, needs maintenance. Iraq will take care of maintenance over the 30 kilometers [19 miles] of pipeline stretching within its territory, while Kuwait will handle its part of the pipeline.”
Iraq has lost billions of dollars annually as a result of wasteful gas flaring and its importation of diesel fuel for electricity. That's not to mention the low levels of energy efficiency because many Iraqi power stations run on dry gas, which is not produced locally.
What has compounded the problem is the reluctance of some oil companies to exploit associated gas despite the increase in Iraq's crude oil production from an average of about 1 million barrels per day in 2003 to roughly 4.3 million per day in December, which increased gas flaring from 700 million cubic feet to 1.5 billion cubic feet daily.
Kuwait will lay the pipeline to the neighboring Rumaila oil field, the largest in the world, under the supervision of the BP oil company. The agreement is likely to be implemented soon, since Kuwait has a demand for natural gas that exceeds its supply by an estimated 500 million cubic feet daily. Kuwait has been unable to curb this deficit in part because of tension among Gulf countries that has prevented Qatari gas from flowing into Kuwait via Saudi Arabia; Reuters reports that much of the shortfall is being covered by imports of liquefied natural gas.
The Iraq-Kuwait associated petroleum gas deal should help Iraq pay off the remaining reparations for the invasion of Kuwait, amounting to $4.5 billion.
Iraq's parliamentary Oil and Gas Committee criticized the government's energy policy for relying on the development of oil production and neglecting natural gas processing, which could put an end to the country's electricity crisis and launch petrochemical industries. Committee member Zaher al-Abadi told Al-Monitor, “Iraq is losing billions of dollars in flaring gas, while the Ministry of Oil is standing idly by.”
Oil expert Hamza al-Jawahiri, who is knowledgeable about the agreements between international oil companies and the Ministry of Oil, and between the ministry and various countries, said Kuwait will process the natural gas in Iraq and then transport it to its cities.
“As per the agreement, Kuwait will bear the expenses of building plants, processing and piping the gas,” he said. The gas will be processed in Iraq by separating impurities and non-methane hydrocarbons and fluids to produce dry natural gas.
Jawahiri added that Kuwait signed an agreement months ago with Basrah Gas Company, which is part of the latest gas export agreement, noting that other sources of gas will include rich oil and gas fields in southern Iraq. Basrah Gas is a consortium of three businesses including the majority shareholder South Gas Co., Shell and Mitsubishi. The consortium exploits gas from three oil fields.
Shaalan al-Daraji, Basrah Gas chief information officer, told Al-Monitor the company’s plan, which runs until 2021, aims to end the flaring of gas in the Zubair, Qurna 1 and Rumaila oil fields. “The company currently produces 700 million cubic feet of gas daily and has a strategic plan to stop gas flaring in oil fields," Daraji said.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi expressed great support for the Kuwait agreement, which could end Iraq’s long-standing estrangement with the Gulf countries, as Kuwait has asked the United Nations Security Council to lift sanctions on Iraq.
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Qatar to Invest in Iraqi Oil
Posted on 04 January 2018 .
By John Lee.
Qatar Petroleum (QP) has confirmed that it plans to invest in Iraq’s upstream oil businesses.
President and CEO Saad Sherida Al Kaabi (pictured) told reporters:
“I have met personally with the Iraq’s Oil Minister (Jabar Al Luaibi) and have conveyed my interest in investing Iraq’s upstream business, and he welcomed that.
“Iraq is a very important country in the region. It has huge resources and needs a lot of investments to bring the country back to the prominence. It is a brotherly country, and we would like to help and assist in developing their upstream business.”
The Peninsula Qatar quotes him as saying that QP is currently exploring best ways of entering the Iraqi market.
(Source: The Peninsula Qatar)
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US Sanctions on PMUs puts Iraq in Tough Spot
Posted on 06 December 2017 .
By Mustafa Saadoun for Al Monitor. Any opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News.
The conflict between the United States and Iran has taken a new turn toward escalation against the Iranian-backed armed Shiite factions in Iraq. But this step might harm Washington’s interests in Baghdad and engage the Iraqi government in a crisis with the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU).
While Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi is trying to strike a balance to tame armed Shiite factions and earn US support, Washington is seeking to add armed factions affiliated with the PMU to the list of terrorist organizations.
The US House of Representatives introduced a bill in early November called “Iranian Proxies Terrorist Sanctions Act of 2017,” which calls for imposing terrorism-related sanctions on Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba and Asaib Ahl al-Haq. The bill was referred Nov. 3 to the Foreign Affairs committee.
Before Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba was formed in 2013, the United States designated its leader Akram al-Kaabi as a terrorist in 2008 per Executive Order No. 13438, on the grounds of “causing chaos in Iraq and threatening the stability and security of the alliance forces which were in Iraq before retreating completely in 2011.”
Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba was blacklisted less than a month after spokeswoman for the US State Department Heather Nauert described Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of the PMU, as a terrorist.
After Muhandis, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba and Asaib Ahl al-Haq were blacklisted, statements of various US Congress members indicated that the United States intends to designate additional Shiite factions as terrorist organizations.
While a harsher tone is being adopted in Iraqi statements against Washington, member of the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee Hanan al-Fatalawi called on the Iraqi Foreign Ministry Nov. 17 to summon the US ambassador to Baghdad to find out the reasons behind “the future US war” on the PMU.
Posted in Security Comments Off on US Sanctions on PMUs puts Iraq in Tough Spot
Japanese Company considers Gas Pipeline and Petchem Plant
Posted on 28 November 2017 .
By John Lee.
Iraq has reportedly contracted Japan’s Toyo Engineering to help build a gas pipeline to Kuwait and a petrochemical plant as Baghdad.
According to a report from Reuters, the move will help Iraq to reduce flaring and finish paying the reparations owed to Kuwait for the invasion in 1990.
The project would allow Kuwait to reduce its dependency on Qatar as a supplier of gas; deliveries could begin as early as 2019.
It would also deal a blow to Shell, which aimed to be the dominant gas player in Iraq before relations with Baghdad soured following it’s planned exit from the Majnoon oil project.
Toyo told Reuters that talks are ongoing and a final decision has not yet been made.
(Source: Reuters)
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Iranian Universities enter Iraq
Posted on 18 October 2017 .
By Zep Kalb for Al-Monitor. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iran Business News.
In the aftermath of the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the country's educational system all but collapsed. Illiteracy rates have exploded. Universities have turned into sectarian battlegrounds.
Systemic violence — including beatings, rape and death threats — has forced students and faculty out of campuses. As state provision of higher education has receded, private donors have set up alternative institutions, often with a sectarian and religious twist. Foreign actors have also stepped in to fill the void.
Before the US-led invasion, education indicators in oil-rich, Baathist-controlled Iraq improved similarly as in other middle-income countries, and in several ways even more so. The country’s first university, Baghdad University, opened its doors in 1957. In 1968, the government made education free and compulsory at all levels.
In 1977, the eradication of illiteracy was made legally binding. The developmental push appeared to be working. By 1980, Iraq had already achieved near universal primary school enrollment.
Saddam Hussein’s devastating eight-year war with Iran in the 1980s and the sanctions imposed by the West over his invasion of Kuwait in the 1990s slowed these gains.
By 2000, the literacy rate of youth aged 15-24 years old stood at 84.8%, slightly higher than that of regional neighbor Egypt. The gender gap was also narrowing: Female literacy rates stood at 80.5% in 2000, a figure Egypt reached only in 2006. At the same time, underinvestment in education by a cash-strapped government led to an aged and creaking infrastructure.
For all its ills, the collapse of the Baathist regime in 2003 and its replacement with a US-installed government wrecked the country’s educational system. Junior, inexperienced American officers who failed to understand the complexities of maintaining peace between the sects were put in charge of higher education.
Posted in Iraq Education and Training News 1 Comment
Baghdad Suspends Int'l Flights to Erbil
Posted on 28 September 2017 .
By John Lee.
Direct international flights will be suspended to and from Erbil International Airport (pictured) starting from Friday evening, following a decision by the Iraqi cabinet and Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, an airline official has told Xinhua.
The move follows the region's vote for independence in Monday's referendum.
Airlines including Qatar Airways, EgyptAir and Lebanon's Middle East Airlines had already informed passengers that flights would be cancelled at the request of Iraq's Civil Aviation Authority.
Only domestic flights will be permitted, and all the already-booked tickets for international flights should be through Baghdad international airport.
Iraq's Tourism Board also announced on the halt of domestic tourism movement to the Kurdish region starting from early next week.
(Sources: Xinhua, The Independent, Reuters)
(Picture credit: Makyol)
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