Iraq analysis

[Al-khiyal]

WASHINGTON, June 15, 2007 -- A military leader fresh from Iraq is the latest US government official to push a common but false claim that the controversial draft oil law will lead to a just division of the proceeds from oil sales and pave the way for reconciliation in the war-torn nation.

Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey, former commander of the Multinational Security Transition Command-Iraq, forwarded claims made by the Bush administration and Congress that if Iraq passes an oil law, the fighting factions there will come together because revenue from oil sales will be distributed to all.

The oil law (also known as the hydrocarbons law), however, does no such thing. A separate revenue-sharing law would decide how the oil revenue is spread around the country. It is currently being negotiated, though far behind the hydrocarbons law in the Iraqi legislative process.

Dempsey, who just returned from his in-Iraq duties, told reporters at a Pentagon briefing Wednesday, "There's an interim step toward reconciliation that might better be described as accommodation," finding "ways to become dependent on each other."

The hydrocarbons law is one way, he said, "where you equitably distribute the resources of the nation, thereby encouraging these three groups to depend on each other for some common commodity."

Only a small portion of the law mentions revenue, and explicitly states that, according to the Iraqi Constitution, a separate "federal revenue law" is required to dictate how the revenue is spent.

President Bush, during remarks with visiting Iraqi President Jalal Talabani May 21, said, "We're working very hard, for example, on getting an oil law with an oil revenue-sharing code that will help unite the country."

Such a law was included in Bush's "benchmarks for reconciliation" in Iraq.

Other US officials, including the vice-president during a visit to Baghdad, have expressed US desires for Iraq to pass an oil law, the one with nonexistent influence on the oil revenue.

Members of Congress as well push the "oil law" as important, also not distinguishing it from revenue assumptions.

"Iraqi progress on an oil law is good news and an important step forward," Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Delaware, said in a February 27 statement after Iraqi negotiators initially approved the hydrocarbons law. "Fair-sharing of Iraq's oil revenue is key to a sustainable political solution, but an oil law by itself will not end the sectarian warfare in Iraq," added Biden, who is in favor of breaking Iraq into Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish states.

The Democratic-led Congress, despite calls from the more progressive members, enshrined the oil law benchmark for the Iraqi government in the Iraq war-spending bill approved last month:

"Enacting and implementing legislation to ensure the equitable distribution of hydrocarbon resources of the people of Iraq without regard to the sect or ethnicity of recipients, and enacting and implementing legislation to ensure that the energy resources of Iraq benefit Sunni Arabs, Shiite Arabs, Kurds, and other Iraqi citizens in an equitable manner."

Iraq oil sales made up more than 93 percent of its federal budget last year. Iraq sells about 1.6 million barrels per day.

The oil law would set guidelines for how Iraq's vast 115 billion barrels of proven reserves - third-largest in the world - are developed. It would determine the role of the central, regional, and provincial governments and the extent of foreign companies' access to Iraq's oil, most of which is not being pumped (and a lot more is considered to be undiscovered).

"The draft hydrocarbons framework law does not define specific terms for the distribution of Iraq's oil revenue," Christopher Blanchard, Middle East policy analyst for the Congressional Research Service, told United Press International. "The law would require Iraq's Council of Ministers to submit a separate federal revenue law to regulate a central Oil Revenue Fund and ensure the fair distribution of oil revenue."

The revenue law is the legislation that would dictate how and to whom the money is distributed.

"The hydrocarbons framework law is important," Blanchard said, "but if equitable oil revenue sharing is a key benchmark for political reconciliation and progress in Iraq, then the ongoing discussions among Iraqis about the terms of the draft revenue law deserve more attention."

As an occupying power in a country rocked by instability after more than four years of war, the misguided pressure on the oil law from the US government actors is likely to work against their stated aims - ensuring Iraqis reap the benefits from their oil.

Analysis: U.S. ignorant on Iraq oil law

[Al-khiyal]

Analysis: U.S. ignorant on Iraq oil law

WASHINGTON, June 15, 2007 -- Getting Iraq's economy, and its oil industry, back on track is critical to that country's stability and day-to-day life.

A new report by the Pentagon suggests that there is a long way to go.

The oil industry is not just hobbled by sabotage on pipelines and a crumbling infrastructure. The government is failing to make the capital investments that it needs to get the oilfields and refineries healthy after more than a decade of neglect.

"Recently available data indicate that the Iraqi government executed 67 percent of its total budget in 2006. Although it effectively paid salaries, wages, and pensions, the government executed only 22 percent of its capital investment budget and only 3 percent of its oil investment budget," states the Pentagon's latest quarterly report to Congress, "Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq."

The United States has spent $1.6 billion on oil sector reconstruction over the last four years but it is not enough to "offset the [government of Iraq's] failure to execute several billion dollars of its own funds in oil sector capital investments. In 2006, for example, the ministry of oil executed only $90 million of its $3.5 billion capital budget."

The report asserts that because the oil ministry does not have "market pressures to stay in business" it lacks an incentive to invest its full capital budget.

"Lack of legislation governing the hydrocarbon sector, non-industry standard procurement policies, lack of skilled technocrats at (the oil ministry), and corruption also continue (to contribute) to under-investment," the report states.

Crime and sabotage, however, play a major role in the oil sector continued stagnation. The northern oilfields are especially unproductive.

"Although prewar oil production in northern Iraq accounted for about one-quarter of Iraq's total capacity, northern oil exports totaled only $1 billion in 2006 - compared with $30 billion in the south, due to sabotage against northern pipelines," states the report.

As much as 70 percent of the fuel refined at the Bayji plant in northern Iraq, amounting to $2 billion a year, has been stolen for sale on the black market.

Iraq oil hobbled by ineptitude, corruption

[Al-khiyal]

Baghdad, June 14, 2007 -- Saif Abdallah says his inventions have helped kill or maim scores, possibly hundreds, of Americans. For more than four years, he has been developing remote-control devices that Sunni insurgents use to detonate improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the roadside bombs that are the No. 1 killer of U.S. soldiers in Iraq. The only time he ever felt a pang of regret was in the spring of 2006, when he heard that the Pentagon, in a bid to fight the growing IED menace, had roped in a team of scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Abdallah, an electronics engineer by training, once dreamed of studying for a Ph.D. there. "I thought to myself, If my life had gone differently, who knows? I might have been on that team," he says, his eyes widening as he imagines that now impossible scenario. Then he shrugs. "God decided I should be on the other side."

Thin-voiced and thickly bespectacled, Abdallah, 28, fits every geek stereotype, right down to the acne and the flash drive on his key chain. His laboratory is a workbench in the bedroom of his Baghdad home. He says his tools are primitive — soldering irons, old printed circuit boards, discarded TV remotes and other bits of electronic detritus. But he has a talent for fashioning instruments of death from such dreck, turning an old toy walkie-talkie into a trigger for an explosion 100 yards away or programming a washing-machine timer to set off an IED two hours later. Such capacity for destruction makes him invaluable to the disparate groups that make up the Sunni insurgency, including al-Qaeda. "In our circle, everyone has heard of him," says the commander of one rebel group, al-Nasr Salahdin.

Sectarian outrages like the June 13 attack on the holy Shi'ite shrine in Samarra — the same site that insurgents blew up in February 2006 — have plunged Iraq into civil war. But it is brainy operatives like Abdallah who pose the most consistently lethal threat to U.S. forces. When we met for our second encounter in 15 months, he didn't seem especially worried that a massive U.S.-Iraqi security crackdown had been under way in Baghdad for the past four months — and that one of its aims was to break the back of the IED industry and roll up people like him. (Abdallah was introduced to TIME through Sunni insurgent contacts, but he did not provide his real name or reveal where he lives.) Iraqi and American officials say they have shut down dozens of bomb factories, arrested nearly 18,000 insurgents and killed more than 3,000 others. But the only metric that matters to Abdallah is the number of Americans killed. By that measure, he figures his side is winning. U.S. casualties have risen every month since February, just after the start of President Bush's surge strategy to quell the bloody Shi'ite-Sunni war. At least 230 service personnel were killed in April and May, making it the deadliest two-month period for U.S. troops since the war began.

It is indicative of the U.S.'s inability to crush the insurgency that commanders are trying to find ways to split it. The military is urging Sunni nationalist groups to take up arms against their former al-Qaeda allies and has begun supplying some of them with weapons. In the immediate future, however, such efforts are unlikely to protect U.S. troops from an increasingly sophisticated and tenacious enemy — and may even put Americans at greater risk. A TIME investigation reveals that militant groups have responded to the U.S. surge with a big push of their own, unleashing a flurry of new or rarely used tactics and innovations designed to maximize the death toll. Their most potent weapons are the roadside bombs being fashioned by men like Abdallah, which now account for roughly 80% of U.S. deaths, up from 50% at the start of the year. "People are calling me all the time, asking for new ways to ..." Abdallah says, pressing down his right thumb on an imaginary remote control, and adds, "... Boom!"

The military's current security push in Baghdad, known to Iraqis as Operation Fard al-Qanoon, or Imposing Law, has elicited opposite responses from Iraq's two warring sects. Shi'ite militias like the Mahdi Army have decided to lie low; their leaders went underground or on vacation to Iran. Sunni groups, especially al-Qaeda's Iraqi wing, have girded for battle. Groups associated with the Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella organization controlled by al-Qaeda, began to confer with one another and with other Sunni groups. "The first thing we realized is that we would need lots of IEDs and car bombs," says al-Nasr Salahdin's field commander, who was involved in some of the discussions. "Once the Americans were fully deployed, it would be hard to move bombs around, so we had to make them quickly and distribute them."

Some insurgent commanders fell back on tactics that worked before, such as moving their operations into areas where there are relatively few U.S. troops. Al-Qaeda elements driven out of Anbar province by the Marines and a coalition of local tribes began to cluster in Diyala. In recent weeks, bombers have struck even farther north, in Mosul, Kirkuk and long-peaceful Kurdistan. But most groups remained in Baghdad and even called in reinforcements. Many al-Qaeda fighters moved from Anbar to the capital, and the Islamic Army, the largest Iraqi insurgent group, called on its fighters to rally there for a cataclysmic showdown with U.S. and Iraqi troops. They began to attack new targets, like U.S. helicopters and important bridges that connect Baghdad to the rest of the country. "These were all new kinds of attacks, and there were so many of them, it was hard to keep track," says a Western official in Baghdad, who asked not to be identified because he is not authorized to speak with the media. "The message from al-Qaeda was, You do your surge, we'll do ours."

The insurgents have upgraded their weaponry. A field commander of the Islamic Army told me his men had produced "hundreds" of huge IEDs more destructive than the armor-piercing bombs that, the U.S. believes, are being smuggled into Iraq from Iran. He said the new bombs are being buried deep in dirt tracks on the outskirts of Baghdad that are likely to be used by American patrols. Some of the bombs are planted in sewers and irrigation culverts; their concrete lining would direct most of the force of an explosion upward — enough to "turn an Abrams tank into an airplane."

Such claims are typically greeted with skepticism by U.S. commanders. There have been no reports of any Abrams tanks being taken out by an IED since the start of the security crackdown. Still, there's anecdotal evidence that deep-buried bombs are having a devastating effect on other heavily armored American vehicles, even those designed to withstand large explosions. The Islamic Army isn't alone in employing this technique. In April a video posted on the Internet by the Islamic State of Iraq showed several Cougars and Nyala RG-31s — "mine protected" troop carriers — being blown up by IEDs. The video showed militants using deep-buried explosives to target vehicles meant to find and disable roadside bombs, like the Buffalo counter-IED vehicle and the Meerkat mine detector. The video's ominous title: "Hunting the Minesweepers."

[Al-khiyal]

Insurgent groups have had four years' practice in making and camouflaging IEDs. The bombs are especially hard to detect in crowded urban areas full of potholes, drains and sewers. The abundance of garbage on Baghdad's streets can defeat devices meant to locate bombs in relatively uncluttered locales. A discarded refrigerator on the curb could be packed with explosives. Every parked car is potentially a vehicle-borne IED (military jargon for a car bomb). Built-up areas also offer hiding places for those who plant the explosives and set them off. Abdallah says he has been asked to make trigger devices that work from as close as 75 feet away.

While urban settings undermine the U.S. military's high-tech tools, they suit the militants' low cunning. One common tactic is to hide bombs in loose rubble, then stack human feces on top; soldiers are less likely to investigate too closely. Other tactics are more complex. In some neighborhoods militants use snipers to lure soldiers toward IEDs. The bombs are hidden in places where the troops would tend to take cover when under fire — behind a hedge or a pile of bricks. Senior Iraqi police officials report that militants hide bombs in human cadavers, dumping them on the street and detonating them when a military or police patrol stops for an inspection. "They know that we can't just leave a body to rot in the street," a police official says. "They are counting on us to do the right thing, then hit us when we do."

American soldiers have paid dearly for their commitment to their fallen comrades. On Memorial Day, six soldiers were killed in roadside bombings in Diyala province, north of Baghdad, as they rushed to the crash site of a downed OH-58D Kiowa scout helicopter. The two crewmen had died in the crash, but the militants who brought the helicopter down, apparently anticipating that a rescue would be attempted, had set up an IED ambush. A more sophisticated operation was mounted on May 12 by Islamic State fighters in rural Mahmudiyah, south of Baghdad. They attacked a U.S. patrol, killing five soldiers and capturing three others. They then planted IEDs in the adjoining palm groves, correctly believing that the military would launch a massive manhunt. One soldier was killed and three others were injured when an IED went off in a field. Two weeks later, the Islamic State claimed in a video that it had killed the three captured soldiers. Other patrols in Mahmudiyah have been hit by attacks involving roadside bombs followed by mortars and small-arms fire.

In response, the U.S. is stepping up its efforts to thwart the growing potency of IEDs. The Pentagon has formed a task force, the Joint IED Defeat Organization (JIEDDO). Its more than 500 workers include "red teams," who spend their days trying to think like insurgents, hoping to stay ahead of them. JIEDDO has spent more than $5 billion in the past three years and has a $4 billion budget for the current year. The Pentagon says its spending yields tangible results. "Three years ago, practically every IED incident created some kind of casualty," says Brigadier General Anthony Tata, JIEDDO's deputy director of operations. "Now the enemy must create six incidents to create a casualty of some variety." But top commanders know that roadside bombs can't really be defeated by gadgetry. At a conference on roadside bombs, Brigadier General Joe Ramirez Jr., deputy commanding general of the Combined Arms Training Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, said, "For every move we make, the enemy makes three ... The enemy changes techniques, tactics and procedures every two to three weeks."

General Richard Cody, Army vice chief of staff, told Congress in April that finding and defusing roadside bombs is not a long-term solution. "The real issue about defeating IEDs ... is not at the point of impact," he said. "We have to go and find the guys making them and kill them. We have to find the guys who are getting ready to place them and kill them. That's how you defeat IEDs."

Abdallah concurs. "They are not going to defeat me with technology," he says. "If they want to get rid of IEDs, they have to kill me and everyone like me." If they don't, Abdallah is only going to get better at what he does, with deadly consequences for American soldiers. The terrorism geek has come a long way since our previous meeting. To demonstrate his prowess, he produces a black briefcase-size device with Japanese markings and flicks a switch on its side. He claims that the device is similar to those used by U.S. troops to block cellular signals around IEDs and disable bombs wired to detonate with a cell-phone call. Abdallah says he was given the device by a Saudi militant who asked him to find a way around jamming signals. He invites the four people in the room to try to use their cell phones; none of us can get a signal. "I've jammed you all," he says, tapping the black device. But his own phone, a cheap Nokia, shows a full-strength signal. "I made a few small changes inside," he says, holding up the phone and grinning triumphantly. "It took me just one day to figure it out." It is grim evidence of the perils facing the U.S. in Iraq that men like Abdallah can still make killing Americans look easy.

"You do your surge, we'll do ours"

[Al-khiyal]

Baghdad, June 15, 2007: A U.S. helicopter gunner looks down over deserted streets
after the Iraqi government imposed a curfew in response to the second bombing
of the Golden Dome mosque in Samarra on Wednesday

[Al-khiyal]

June 15, 2007 -- Iraq's archaeological and artistic culture is in danger of being wiped out due to a lack of protection and targeted assassinations, a group of archaeologists and artists have told Al Jazeera.

According to figures from the ministry of culture, 18 archaeologists and researchers have been killed since late 2005.

Fuad Rassi, an Iraqi archaeologist and professor of antiquities at Baghdad University, said: "We are unable to protect important historical sites and the remaining books and parchments documenting Iraq's culture have been stolen from local libraries."

Rassi also said the intimidation and murder of archaeologists since the 2003 US-led invasion has impeded the country's research into, and preservation of, millennary culture.

He said: "There aren't archaeologists remaining in Iraq because most of them have been killed and the others have fled from the violence. Our situation is getting critical in Iraq. Archaeologists and artists are being targeted by militias and insurgents."

Bitter legacy

In May 2003, the UN Security Council passed resolution 1483 which stressed "the need for respect for the archaeological, historical, cultural, and religious heritage of Iraq, and for the continued protection of archaeological, historical, cultural, and religious sites, museums, libraries, and monuments".

But Lamia Al-Gailani-Werr, an Iraqi archaeologist and member of the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and former adviser to the Iraqi Reconstruction and Development Council, says the looting and destruction of Iraq's sites has continued despite international awareness.

"The destruction of Iraq's heritage is leaving a bitter legacy for future generations," she told Al Jazeera previously.

Meanwhile, Baghdad authorities are facing growing challenges as they pursue artefacts smugglers or provide protection to endangered sites.

Iraq's ministry of culture says its employees are unable to continue their research or visit existing sites and excavations due to security risks.

Mariam Muhammad, a senior official at the ministry, said: "We are seeing the history of Iraq being lost and because of violence we cannot move to afford protection. Professionals in the area are being killed on [a] daily basis and our employees are afraid to leave their homes."

Haythem Abdel-Lattef, 56, an archaeologist who was working at the Babylon heritage sites south of Baghdad in 2006, chose to leave Iraq seven months ago after one of his sons was kidnapped.

He said: "I received telephone calls which threatened me, saying that if I didn't flee Iraq within one week, they were going to kill my sons and wife. I packed and after two days I arrived in Jordan where I'm facing difficult financial conditions as I had to leave everything behind in Baghdad."

After arriving in Jordan, he said he received word that two of his colleagues who had been excavating new sites near Babylon were killed.

Artists, singers targeted

The culture ministry's Muhammad said that in addition to the threat to Iraq's archaeological resources, many of Iraq's leading authors, artists and singers have been persecuted and killed - victims of the country's sectarian violence.

In February 2007, the Iraqi Artist's Association said 75 singers had been killed between March 2003 and December 2006. The association also said 80 per cent of the country's singers had fled the country.

But those that braved the bullets and continued to perform have often paid the price.

In November, Youssef Jabry, 20, was beheaded for singing Western songs at parties and wedding receptions while popular comedian Walid Hassan, who often mocked post-invasion politics, was shot to death as he drove through Baghdad.

In December, Muttashar Al-Soudani, Iraqi soap opera icon, was gunned down by unknown assailants as he collected his pension in Baghdad.

In January, Wissam Abdallah, 25, an up-and-coming actor, was killed by unknown fighters.

Betraying Islam

Abdallah's mother, Salua Abdel-Kader, 48, told Al Jazeera her son was killed because he was "seen as a sinner" by Islamic factions which have gained power in post-war Iraq.

He said: "I lost my son who was an actor because he was performing at the theatre and for this reason considered a betrayer of Islam."

His murder and the pursuit of other actors and singers have sowed fear among the performing arts community in and around Baghdad.

Abdel-Kader said: "Our lives have been inside the walls of our houses. The maximum entertainment that you can find today is going to your neighbour for a [cup of] tea and nowadays, even this diversion sometimes isn't possible because of the spread sectarian violence.

"We cannot visit museums, theatres or libraries because art in Iraq today has been considered a sin by extremists."

Graveyard for artists

Since May 2007, three Baghdad artists were killed, including Khalil al-Zahawi, renowned Islamic calligrapher.

A senior member of the Calligraphy and Arabesque Art Department at the Nineveh Institute of Fine Arts told Al Jazeera that he believed conditions in Iraq have made it a graveyard for artists and innovation.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity because he has been threatened with death, he said Islamic extremism has forced many of his colleagues to either flee Iraq or go undercover.

"Only Islamic art is permissible because the new Islamic groups like al-Qaeda feel there is no importance to us. Those of us who paint portraits, for example, are seen as sinners," he said in a small unfurnished apartment in Damascus.

"Those that cannot leave Iraq because of financial constraints find themselves going hungry - hungry and fearful that the next bullet or sword is destined for them."

Assassinations

One such Iraqi artist was condemned to death by Islamist groups for belonging to "a Zionist organisation".

Maher Harbi, a Christian artist in northern Iraq, managed to survive two successive assassination attempts before fleeing to Syria.

He had been a member of an association of Shia, Sunni, Christian and secular artists who met once every week to discuss holding ateliers and exhibits.

But Mohammed Alban, a photographer for al-Sharqiya satellite channel, wasn't so lucky. His assassination led to the dissolution of the Mosul chapter of the artists'association in late 2006.

Muhammad Khalid Lattif, actor and member of the Iraqi Artists Association who survived an assassination attempt, said: "Even if we work, how can we put in practice or expose our projects to Iraqis? There aren't places [to exhibit] because everywhere is under security and as soon as we reach to wherever the place is, we are going to be killed.

"We will cry all together for this sad reality threatening our culture."

Iraq's cultural heritage in ruins

[Al-khiyal]

BAGHDAD, June 15, 2007: A U.S. Air Force F-16 fighter jet crashed Friday during an air support mission for ground forces in Iraq, the Central Air Command reported.

The crash came after Defense Secretary Robert Gates made an unannounced visit to Baghdad. The U.S. military also said five soldiers had died on Thursday.

The Air Force announcement, which referred to the crash as an accident, did not say where it occurred or what happened to the pilot, the single crew member.

The loss of an F-16, a workhorse warplane in the Iraq war, is a rare event. One crashed last Nov. 27 in the western province of Anbar, killing the pilot.

The jet was deployed to the 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing at Balad Air Base, 80 kilometers, or 50 miles, north of Baghdad.

"The cause of the accident is under investigation," said the statement from the Central Command Air Forces, which provided no further details.

Gates said Friday that Washington was disappointed with the Iraqi government's efforts to pass laws aimed at reconciling the country's warring factions.

He flew into Baghdad to assess a U.S. troop build-up aimed at buying leaders of Iraq's ethnic and religious groups more time to reach a political accommodation and press the government to move faster in passing the laws.

His comments were some of the strongest criticism to date of the Iraqi government, although he took care to stress that Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki faced "enormous obstacles" and deserved Washington's continued support.

As he flew to Baghdad with reporters, Gates said the U.S. military was not trying to paint an overly optimistic picture of how the war is going.

"It's a very mixed picture," he said when asked whether the military and General David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, were offering realistic assessments of the violence in Baghdad. Since February 14, the military has sent nearly 30,000 more soldiers to Iraq, most of them to the capital.

"I have every confidence in General Petraeus and in his ability and willingness to call it as he sees it," Gates said.

In the deep south of Iraq, the police said bombers posing as television cameramen destroyed an important Sunni shrine in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city. Maliki ordered an indefinite curfew in the city. He also extended the vehicle ban in Baghdad for one more day.

Photographs of the Sunni Talha Bin al-Zubair shrine, 20 kilometers, or 13 miles, outside Basra, showed that the big structure was leveled, a result that would have required huge amounts of explosives - more than even several men could have carried into the mosque concealed in television equipment bags.

The driving ban in Baghdad kept the city relatively quiet for a second day after the provocative attack on the Askariya Shiite shrine that brought down its golden minarets in Samarra, 90 kilometers to the north.

There were 16 reported violent deaths nationwide on Friday, one of them a body dumped in Baghdad. The daily totals of the death squad victims in Baghdad have been running well-above 20.

U.S. F-16 fighter jet crashes in Iraq