Category: Iraq

Baghdad today, on the eve of provincial elections, feels like it has emerged from several years of horrendous violence, but do not be misled. Every Iraqi I’ve spoken with feels it is tenuous, the still-fragile lull too young to trust. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees provides recent statistics showing that more Iraqis continue

BAGHDAD — Uncertainty and tension are running high in Baghdad ahead of the provincial election due Jan. 31. But this time fears are also touched by a new hope. “Iraq is transitioning into something more stable,” former Iraqi interim prime minister Ayad Allawi told IPS. “The U.S. is pulling out soon because of the new

BAQUBA — A nurse at Baquba General Hospital asked Ahmed Ali, who co-authored this report, for a bribe to look after his sick baby. It was hardly an exceptional demand. Patients around Iraq have begun commonly to speak of the need to bribe medical staff to get some form of care. “Nurses in Iraqi hospitals

BAGHDAD — Not even the elevators work now at Baghdad Medical City, built once as the centre for some of the best medical care. One of the ten elevators still does, and the priority for this is patients who have lost their legs — and there are many of them. The rest, the doctors, patients

“Iraq: Not our country to Return to” for Inter Press Service, by Maki al-Nazzal and Dahr Jamail, voted #1 most censored story of 2008 by Project Censored. More information about the story: #1. Over One Million Iraqi Deaths Caused by US Occupation in Top 25 Censored Stories for 2009 Sources: After Downing Street, July 6,

MARFA, Texas — Aside from the Iraqi people, nobody knows what the U.S. military is doing in Iraq better than the soldiers themselves. A new book gives readers vivid and detailed accounts of the devastation the U.S. occupation has brought to Iraq, in the soldiers’ own words. “Winter Soldier Iraq and Afghanistan: Eyewitness Accounts of

BAQUBA — Residents of Baquba deny police claims that kidnappings are now a matter of the past. “There are fewer people disappearing, but it continues,” a trader who asked to be referred to as Abu Ali told IPS. “All of us know that several people are still being kidnapped every week.” A local sheikh, speaking

FALLUJAH — Fallujah is quiet these days. After all the fighting and destruction of 2004, U.S. and Iraqi forces call this success. Many residents are not so sure. Fallujah, 60km west of Baghdad, produced some of the strongest resistance yet to U.S. forces and their Iraqi collaborators. These forces led two severe assaults on the

BAQUBA — A military operation said to target al-Qaeda has ended up targeting Sunni Muslims instead, creating new sectarian tensions. A U.S.-backed security operation launched last month has only targeted cities with majority Sunni populations such as Buhriz, Tahreer, Qatoon, Mafraq, and Hay in Diyala province, north of Baghdad. The operation has drawn more than

BAQUBA — The surprise removal of the Diyala police chief has brought new hope of a more secure future. The decision by members of the ruling council of Diyala governorate to discharge provincial police chief Ghanim al-Quraishi brought celebrations in its wake. In Baquba, 40 km northeast of Baghdad, and capital of Diyala province, Quraishi