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 Business News. […]
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", […]
When asked what represented the greatest challenge for a statesman, British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan replied: “Events, my dear boy, events”. Fifty years later, the same thought must have gone through the mind of Nouri al-Maliki as he prepared to meet the Kuwaiti Prime Minister, Sheikh Nasser al-Mohammed al-Sabah, in an historic meeting in Baghdad, […]
Overview Levels of violence fell in Iraq last week. Militant activity was concentrated in the central region, although there were also several bombings in Mosul. The majority of explosive devices detonated over the week were small, usually inflicting injuries rather than fatalities. Shootings are currently more of a concern, with the authorities put on high […]
By Ranj Alaaldin, a Middle East political and security risk analyst based at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He visits the Middle East regularly and as part of his recent work on Iraq has visited the country on a number of fact-finding missions. Foreign Policy magazine recently listed him among its 100 […]
Another wild-card was thrown into the Iraqi mix on Wednesday with the return of radical Shia'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr from nearly four years of self-imposed exile in Iran. A fierce opponent of the United States and head of Iraq's feared militia, the Mehdi Army, al-Sadr's return was reportedly low-key, and was not entirely unexpected following […]
Nouri al-Maliki has made progress in his bid to retain power, having secured the backing of the main Shi'ite parliamentary bloc for his re-nomination for the post of Prime Minister. He notably received support from the self-exiled, hard-line cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, leading to increased concerns amongst the Sunni population. Al-Maliki still requires the support of […]
