Land Allocated for Residential City in Basra
By John Lee. Iraq's Council of Ministers has allocated 9,600 acres to create a new residential city in Basra. The statement from the Council's secretariat says that the plan is to create 100,000 new residential units in the city. (Source: Iraqi Cabinet)
US Contractor Pays Millions for Torture in Iraq
By John Lee. An American defense contractor has paid $5.28 million to resolve a case in which it was accused of mistreating detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and other facilities. The 72 plaintiffs alleged that employees of L-3 Services, now called Engility Corporation, tortured and abused them. The abuses caused widespread outrage, and led to […]
Oil Exports Down in December
By John Lee. Iraq's crude oil exports fell by 11 percent in December due to bad weather in southern oil export terminals and the suspension of exports from Kurdistan, according to a report from Dow Jones. Exports averaged 2.348 million bpd, down from 2.620 million bpd in November. From the south, Iraq exported 2.023 million bpd, […]
Iraq "Needs $20bn to Upgrade Agriculture"
By John Lee. Iraq's Parliamentary Agriculture Committee says that Iraq needs investment of more than $20 billion to upgrade the agricultural sector. Committee member Kadhim al-Bahadili told AIN: "The deliberate negligence by the former regime to the agricultural sector caused significant desertification and obliged 80 percent of the farmers to abandon their lands and move […]
$4.6bn Iranian Exports to Iraq in 9 Months
By John Lee. Iran's exports to Iraq totalled $4.59 billion during the last nine months, reports the country's IRNA news agency. The Iranian customs department announced at the beginning of last December that Iraq is "a pioneering state in importing Iranian commodities". Aswat al-Iraq reports that since the downfall of the previous regime in 2003, […]
MP Accuses Turkey of Limiting Water Supply
By John Lee. An Iraqi Member of Parliament has accused Turkey of limiting the supply of water to Iraq for political reasons. MP Karim Elewi of the Parliamentary Agriculture Committee said Iraqi agriculture was being damaged by the shortage of the water amount coming from Turkey, and by governmental neglect for this important sector, which […]
Capacity Building Workshop on Survey Questionnaire Design
As part of its support to the Council of Representatives (CoR), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), with support from the Inter-Agency Information and Analysis Unit (IAU), conducted a workshop on survey questionnaire design for 24 researchers from the CoR Research Directorate. The training was held at the Council of Representatives in Baghdad on 23 […]
Emergency Parliament Session Indicates Size of Opposition to Maliki
By Reidar Visser. The following article was published by Reidar Visser, an historian of Iraq educated at the University of Oxford and currently based at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. It is reproduced here with the author’s permission. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq […]
Weekly Security Update
By Gary Sandiford, Olive Group’s Dubai based assessments manager. Olive Group is a leading provider of security and technology solutions and has operated continuously in Iraq since 2003. Overview Olive Groups Iraq statistics are drawn from multiple sources, including media reporting and direct liaison with in country assets. Included within the statistics are a […]
Genel Energy Starts Direct Oil Export to Turkey
By John Lee. Genel Energy has started shipping crude oil directly into Turkey from its Taq Taq oil field (pictured) in Iraqi Kurdistan, two weeks after exports from the region were halted, reports Bloomberg. According to the report, the KRG won’t resume exports through the central government pipeline network until the federal authorities pay the […]
Iraq Names New Deputy Oil Minister
By John Lee. The former head of the South Oil Company (SOC), Fayadh Hassan Nima [Niama], has been named to replace Ahmad Shamaa [Ahmed al-Shamma] (pictured) as Deputy Oil Minister. Shamma, whose responsibilities included downstream activities and overseeing the Basra Gas Company -- the joint venture between Shell, Mitsubishi and the South Gas Company -- […]
Petroceltic Updates on Iraqi Operations
By John Lee. As part of its operational update yesterday, Petroceltic gave an update on its operations in Iraqi Kurdistan: An active exploration and development programme is scheduled for 2013 with a capital expenditure budget of US$150 million. Exploration drilling and seismic acquisition accounts for approximately 43 percent of the budget with the balance committed […]