Iraqi blocs sign a document reforms give the government and parliament 45 days

[yota691]

Source reveals a new proposal for the leadership of the blocks cancels the previous on the dismissal of the government

Political | 09:22 - 18/11/2019

 

 

 

 

BAGHDAD - Mawazine News
revealed a source familiar with the source on Monday reveals a new proposal being circulated among the leaders of political blocs cancels the previous proposal on the dismissal of the government.
The source said that "the continuation of popular demonstrations at this pace, may accelerate the maturity of a proposed solution being discussed since last Saturday narrowly among the leaders of Iraqi political blocs, and cancel the previous agreement, which was sponsored by the commander of the" Qods Force "Iranian Qasem Soleimani, which curbed the movement Dismiss or resign the government. "
He added: "The new proposal is based on the announcement of early elections in the country within a period not exceeding one year after the vote on a new electoral law, and the formation of a new election commission."
He explained: "This proposal may be very suitable for the street and for the religious authority in Najaf (represented by Mr. Ali al-Sistani), which lined up with the demonstrators."

 

 

[yota691]

Joint efforts between Baghdad operations and demonstrators .. Arrest gang tried to steal the Central Bank

2019-11-18

Baghdad Operations Command announced on Monday the arrest of a gang that tried to steal the Central Bank, indicating that the foiling of the operation came in cooperation with the demonstrators.

`` With the cooperation and news of peaceful demonstrators, the Baghdad Operations Command was able to arrest a gang of ten defendants who tried to approach the Central Bank with the aim of stealing and damaging, after midnight Sunday, November 17, 2019, '' the command said in a statement.

She added, "They were referred to the investigation to receive their punishment according to the law."

[6ly410]

 

[6ly410]

Monday، 18 November 2019 01:23 AM

US will not hesitate to sanction Iraqi officials, White House

https://www.thebaghdadpost.com/en/Story/44685/US-will-not-hesitate-to-sanction-Iraqi-officials-White-House

 

The United States would impose sanctions if Iraqi officials were found to be involved in the crackdown on demonstrations, a senior White House official said, noting that Washington knew that Iranian General Qassem Soleimani was behind the suppression of the protests and had been to Baghdad.

Soleimani is the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps - Quds Force.

In an exclusive interview, the US official said: “The situation in Iraq is pretty bad. It is so sad to see so many young people shot dead.”

He said that the US does not want to give the impression that the United States is intervening in Iraq because some will use this and use it as evidence of Western intervention and this is the case In Lebanon, where we are accused of being behind the demonstrations.

Washington knows that Iran was behind the attempts to suppress the revolutions, he said.

“The Iranian intervention in Iraq is clear and we know that Qassem Soleimani went to Baghdad and told the government how to crush protestors. … the Iranians have a pretty well-established mechanism for doing that. And, you know, we have open-source reporting of snipers shooting protesters.”

“We were really intrigued yesterday by the story about the Iraqi national football team beating the Iranians and the soccer players wearing masks in solidarity with the protesters. And that’s a symbolic thing but it can, I think, really focus international attention. And I think that’s what we want to do.” the official said.

He said they discussed the demonstrations in Iraq as well as the situation in Lebanon and Syria at the meeting of the strategic alliance in the Middle East, known as Mesa, which includes the GCC countries along with Egypt and Jordan “in order to come up with a unified international response on Iraq.”

“We appreciate the role of the United Nations mission in Iraq. And I think that enlarging their mandate and having them support new elections, and revising the Iraqi electoral law so that the mechanism of government is more effective and responsive is another good tool that isn’t just the United States," he said.

“But we want to find other ways to support the demonstrators and I think they are in providing American medical assistance to the demonstrators.”

"We see a reaction from the Iraqi people and the demonstrators, which is hostile to Iran in nature, and it will be difficult to arrest them only with a campaign of violence and arrests. This will be condemned in the Security Council and by the international community. If there is a campaign to suppress the demonstration, I think this will unite the international community to impose quick sanctions on Iran ".

“This may be the best way to reverse Iran's influence in Iraq," the official said.

“We will not hesitate to impose sanctions on Iraqi officials, including blocking the entry of the United States and freezing their assets. We have done this in the past with one of our NATO allies,” he said.

“We’re bound by the law not to provide security assistance to counterparts that are engaged in gross human rights violations. So, we’ve warned the Iraqi government and our counterparts in the Iraqi security forces. That if you take part in violent oppression of protesters, we are required by law to stop all of the foreign aid assistance given to the security forces which is considerable. If any evidence shows they are doing so, we will do so,” he said. “And it applies in Lebanon as it does in Iraq.”

[Butifldrm]

The US is definitely Sanctioning The Corrupt and Murderers of Demonstrators

 

 

 

THE WORLD IS WATCHING: Mike Pompeo URGENT Press Conference at the State Department

10,832 views

•Nov 18, 2019

 

Edited November 18, 2019 by Butifldrm

[Butifldrm]

Date: 2014-01-26

ALL OF THE IRAQI ARMY’S INTELLIGENCE — CONSIDER IT YOURS. TELL ME WHATEVER YOU NEED AND I WILL PROVIDE IT FOR YOU.

ALL OF THE IRAQI ARMY’S INTELLIGENCE — CONSIDER IT YOURS. TELL ME WHATEVER YOU NEED AND I WILL PROVIDE IT FOR YOU.

The Iran Cables: Secret Documents Show How Tehran Wields Power in Iraq

Hundreds of leaked intelligence reports shed light on a shadow war for regional influence — and the battles within the Islamic Republic’s own spy divisions

By Tim Arango, James Risen, Farnaz Fassihi, Ronen Bergman and Murtaza Hussain

Nov. 18, 2019

In mid-October, with unrest swirling in Baghdad, a familiar visitor slipped quietly into the Iraqi capital. The city had been under siege for weeks, as protesters marched in the streets, demanding an end to corruption and calling for the ouster of the prime minister, Adil Abdul Mahdi. In particular, they denounced the outsize influence of their neighbor Iran in Iraqi politics, burning Iranian flags and attacking an Iranian consulate.

The visitor was there to restore order, but his presence highlighted the protesters’ biggest grievance: he was Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, head of Iran’s powerful Quds Force, and he had come to persuade an ally in the Iraqi Parliament to help the prime minister hold onto his job.

It was not the first time General Suleimani had been dispatched to Baghdad to do damage control. Tehran’s efforts to prop up Mr. Mahdi are part of its long campaign to maintain Iraq as a pliable client state.

Now leaked Iranian documents offer a detailed portrait of just how aggressively Tehran has worked to embed itself into Iraqi affairs, and of the unique role of General Suleimani. The documents are contained in an archive of secret Iranian intelligence cables obtained by The Intercept and shared with The New York Times for this article, which is being published simultaneously by both news organizations.

The unprecedented leak exposes Tehran’s vast influence in Iraq, detailing years of painstaking work by Iranian spies to co-opt the country’s leaders, pay Iraqi agents working for the Americans to switch sides and infiltrate every aspect of Iraq’s political, economic and religious life.

Many of the cables describe real-life espionage capers that feel torn from the pages of a spy thriller. Meetings are arranged in dark alleyways and shopping malls or under the cover of a hunting excursion or a birthday party. Informants lurk at the Baghdad airport, snapping pictures of American soldiers and keeping tabs on coalition military flights. Agents drive meandering routes to meetings to evade surveillance. Sources are plied with gifts of pistachios, cologne and saffron. Iraqi officials, if necessary, are offered bribes. The archive even contains expense reports from intelligence ministry officers in Iraq, including one totaling 87.5 euros spent on gifts for a Kurdish commander.

ABOUT THE IRAN CABLES

This article was reported in partnership with The Intercept, a nonprofit investigative news organization.

[Read the key findings from this investigation.]

According to one of the leaked Iranian intelligence cables, Mr. Mahdi, who in exile worked closely with Iran while Saddam Hussein was in power in Iraq, had a “special relationship with the I.R.I.” — the Islamic Republic of Iran — when he was Iraq’s oil minister in 2014. The exact nature of that relationship is not detailed in the cable, and, as one former senior U.S. official cautioned, a “special relationship could mean a lot of things — it doesn’t mean he is an agent of the Iranian government.” But no Iraqi politician can become prime minister without Iran’s blessing, and Mr. Mahdi, when he secured the premiership in 2018, was seen as a compromise candidate acceptable to both Iran and the United States.

The leaked cables offer an extraordinary glimpse inside the secretive Iranian regime. They also detail the extent to which Iraq has fallen under Iranian influence since the American invasion in 2003, which transformed Iraq into a gateway for Iranian power, connecting the Islamic Republic’s geography of dominance from the shores of the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea.

2003 U.S. Army soldiers search a presidential palace in Baghdad. John Moore/Associated Press

The trove of leaked Iranian intelligence reports largely confirms what was already known about Iran’s firm grip on Iraqi politics. But the reports reveal far more than was previously understood about the extent to which Iran and the United States have used Iraq as a staging area for their spy games. They also shed new light on the complex internal politics of the Iranian government, where competing factions are grappling with many of the same challenges faced by American occupying forces as they struggled to stabilize Iraq after the United States invasion.

And the documents show how Iran, at nearly every turn, has outmaneuvered the United States in the contest for influence.

The archive is made up of hundreds of reports and cables written mainly in 2014 and 2015 by officers of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security, or M.O.I.S., who were serving in the field in Iraq. The intelligence ministry, Iran’s version of the C.I.A., has a reputation as an analytical and professional agency, but it is overshadowed and often overruled by its more ideological counterpart, the Intelligence Organization of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which was formally established as an independent entity in 2009 at the order of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

In Iraq, Lebanon and Syria, which Iran considers crucial to its national security, the Revolutionary Guards — and in particular its elite Quds Force, led by General Suleimani — determines Iran’s policies. Ambassadors to those countries are appointed from the senior ranks of the Revolutionary Guards, not the foreign ministry, which oversees the intelligence ministry, according to several advisers to current and past Iranian administrations. Officers from the intelligence ministry and from the Revolutionary Guards in Iraq worked parallel to one another, said these sources. They reported their findings back to their respective headquarters in Tehran, which in turn organized them into reports for the Supreme Council of National Security.

Cultivating Iraqi officials was a key part of their job, and it was made easier by the alliances many Iraqi leaders forged with Iran when they belonged to opposition groups fighting Saddam Hussein. Many of Iraq’s foremost political, military, and security officials have had secret relationships with Tehran, according to the documents. The same 2014 cable that described Mr. Mahdi’s “special relationship” also named several other key members of the cabinet of former Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi as having close ties with Iran.

[Undated Fragment]

هدف بالفعل که ایشان می تواند همکاری نماید در راستای اشراف اطلاعاتی از روابط و برنامه های دولت ایالات متحده آمریکا در عراق و بر خورد با موضوع داعش و هر گونه برنامه پنهان این کشور در این موضوع، و در هدف بالقوه ایشان می تواند نشانگر خوبی در وزارت خارجه آمریکا و یا در بین افراد مستعد همکاری، سران اهل سنت و اکراد عراق، باشد.

The current objective is for this person to provide intelligence insights into the U.S. government’s plans in Iraq, whether it is for dealing with ISIS or any other covert operations. The ultimate goal is for this person to be an informant, either in the U.S. State Department or with any Iraqi Sunni or Kurdish leaders who are willing to cooperate.

A political analyst and adviser on Iraq to Iran’s government, Gheis Ghoreishi, confirmed that Iran has focused on cultivating high-level officials in Iraq. “We have a good number of allies among Iraqi leaders who we can trust with our eyes closed,” he said.

Three Iranian officials were asked to comment for this article, in queries that described the existence of the leaked cables and reports. Alireza Miryusefi, a spokesman for Iran’s United Nations mission, said he was away until later this month. Majid Takht-Ravanchi, Iran’s United Nations ambassador, did not respond to a written request that was hand-delivered to his official residence. Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif did not respond to an emailed request.

When reached by telephone, Hassan Danaiefar, Iran’s ambassador to Iraq from 2010 to 2017 and a former deputy commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ naval forces, declined to directly address the existence of the cables or their release, but he did suggest that Iran had the upper hand in information gathering in Iraq. “Yes, we have a lot of information from Iraq on multiple issues, especially about what America was doing there,” he said. “There is a wide gap between the reality and perception of U.S. actions in Iraq. I have many stories to tell.” He declined to elaborate.

According to the reports, after the American troop withdrawal in 2011, Iran moved quickly to add former C.I.A. informants to its payroll. One undated section of an intelligence ministry cable shows that Iran began the process of recruiting a spy inside the State Department. It is unclear what came of the recruitment effort, but according to the files, Iran had started meeting with the source, and offered to reward the potential asset with a salary, gold coins and other gifts. The State Department official is not named in the cable, but the person is described as someone who would be able to provide “intelligence insights into the U.S. government’s plans in Iraq, whether it is for dealing with ISIS or any other covert operations.”

“The subject’s incentive in collaborating will be financial,” the report said.

The State Department declined to comment on the matter.

In interviews, Iranian officials acknowledged that Iran viewed surveillance of American activity in Iraq after the United States invasion as critical to its survival and national security. When American forces toppled Saddam Hussein, Iran swiftly moved some of its best officers from both the intelligence ministry and from the Intelligence Organization of the Revolutionary Guards to Iraq, according to the Iranian government advisers and a person affiliated with the Guards. President George W. Bush had declared Iran to be part of an “axis of evil,” and Iranian leaders believed Tehran would be next on Washington’s list of regime-change capitals after Kabul and Baghdad.

700 pages of documents

Around the world, governments have had to contend with the occasional leak of secret communiqués or personal emails as a fact of modern life. Not so in Iran, where information is tightly controlled and the security services are widely feared.

The roughly 700 pages of leaked reports were sent anonymously to The Intercept, which translated them from Persian to English and shared them with The Times. The Intercept and The Times verified the authenticity of the documents but do not know who leaked them. The Intercept communicated over encrypted channels with the source, who declined to meet with a reporter. In these anonymous messages, the source said that they wanted to “let the world know what Iran is doing in my country Iraq.”

2005 Adil Abdul Mahdi, near the end of his term as Iraq’s finance minister. He became prime minister in 2018. Joao Silva/The New York Times

Like the internal communications of any spy service, some of the reports contain raw intelligence whose accuracy is questionable, while others appear to represent the views of intelligence officers and sources with their own agendas.

Some of the cables show bumbling and comical ineptitude, like one that describes the Iranian spies who broke into a German cultural institute in Iraq only to find they had the wrong codes and could not unlock the safes. Other officers were browbeaten by their superiors in Tehran for laziness, and for sending back to headquarters reports that relied only on news accounts.

But by and large, the intelligence ministry operatives portrayed in the documents appear patient, professional and pragmatic. Their main tasks are to keep Iraq from falling apart; from breeding Sunni militants on the Iranian border; from descending into sectarian warfare that might make Shia Muslims the targets of violence; and from spinning off an independent Kurdistan that would threaten regional stability and Iranian territorial integrity. The Revolutionary Guards and General Suleimani have also worked to eradicate the Islamic State, but with a greater focus on maintaining Iraq as a client state of Iran and making sure that political factions loyal to Tehran remain in power.

This portrait is all the more striking at a time of heightened tensions between the United States and Iran. Since 2018, when President Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal and reimposed sanctions, the White House has rushed ships to the Persian Gulf and reviewed military plans for war with Iran. In October, the Trump administration promised to send American troops to Saudi Arabia following attacks on oil facilities there for which Iran was widely blamed.

2011 U.S. and Iraqi military officials attend a signing ceremony handing control of Camp Victory, a central base for U.S. forces during the Iraq War, over to Iraq. Andrea Bruce for The New York Times

‘Tell them we are at your service.’

With a shared faith and tribal affiliations that span a porous border, Iran has long been a major presence in Southern Iraq. It has opened religious offices in Iraq’s holy cities and posted banners of Iran’s revolutionary leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, on its streets. It supports some of the most powerful political parties in the south, dispatches Iranian students to study in Iraqi seminaries and sends Iranian construction workers to build Iraqi hotels and refurbish Iraqi shrines.

But while Iran may have bested the United States in the contest for influence in Baghdad, it has struggled to win popular support in the Iraqi south. Now, as the last six weeks of protests make clear, it is facing unexpectedly strong pushback. Across the south, Iranian-backed Iraqi political parties are seeing their headquarters burned and their leading operatives assassinated, an indication that Iran may have underestimated the Iraqi desire for independence not just from the United States but also from its neighbor.

In a sense, the leaked Iranian cables provide a final accounting of the 2003 United States invasion of Iraq. The notion that the Americans handed control of Iraq to Iran when they invaded now enjoys broad support, even within the United States military. A recent two-volume history of the Iraq War, published by the United States Army, details the campaign’s many missteps and its “staggering cost” in lives and money. Nearly 4,500 American troops were killed, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died and American taxpayers spent up to $2 trillion on the war. The study, which totals hundreds of pages and draws on declassified documents, concludes: “An emboldened and expansionist Iran appears to be the only victor.”

TURKEY

Tigris

SYRIA

IRAQ

IRAN

Akkaz

gas field

Baghdad

Falluja

Jurf Al-Sakhar

Karbala

NAJAF

Euphrates

SAUDI ARABIA

KUWAIT

100 MILES

By The New York Times

Iran’s rise as a power player in Iraq was in many ways a direct consequence of Washington’s lack of any post-invasion plan. The early years following the fall of Saddam were chaotic, both in terms of security and in the lack of basic services like water and electricity. To most observers on the ground, it appeared as if the United States was shaping policy on the go, and in the dark.

Among the most disastrous American policies were the decisions to dismantle Iraq’s armed forces and to purge from government service or the new armed forces any Iraqi who had been a member of Saddam’s ruling Baath Party. This process, known as de-Baathification, automatically marginalized most Sunni men. Unemployed and resentful, they formed a violent insurgency targeting Americans and Shias seen as United States allies.

As sectarian warfare between Sunnis and Shias raged, the Shia population looked to Iran as a protector. When ISIS gained control of territory and cities, the Shias’ vulnerability and the failure of the United States to protect them fueled efforts by the Revolutionary Guards and General Suleimani to recruit and mobilize Shia militias loyal to Iran.

According to the intelligence ministry documents, Iran has continued to take advantage of the opportunities the United States has afforded it in Iraq. Iran, for example, reaped an intelligence windfall of American secrets as the United States presence began to recede after its 2011 troop withdrawal. The C.I.A. had tossed many of its longtime secret agents out on the street, leaving them jobless and destitute in a country still shattered from the invasion — and fearful that they could be killed for their links with the United States, possibly by Iran. Short of money, many began to offer their services to Tehran. And they were happy to tell the Iranians everything they knew about C.I.A. operations in Iraq.

Qassim Suleimani, head of Iran’s Quds Force, in Tehran in 2016. Ebrahim Noroozi/Associated Press

In November 2014, one of them, an Iraqi who had spied for the C.I.A., broke and terrified that his ties to the Americans would cost him his life, switched sides. The C.I.A., according to the cable, had known the man by a nickname: “Donnie Brasco.” His Iranian handler would call him, simply “Source 134992.”

Turning to Iran for protection, he said that everything he knew about American intelligence gathering in Iraq was for sale: the locations of C.I.A. safe houses; the names of hotels where C.I.A. operatives met with agents; details of his weapons and surveillance training; the names of other Iraqis working as spies for the Americans.

Source 134992 told the Iranian operatives he had worked for the agency for 18 months starting in 2008, on a program targeting Al Qaeda. He said he had been paid well for his work — $3,000 per month, plus a one-time bonus of $20,000 and a car.

But swearing on the Quran, he promised that his days of spying for the United States were over, and agreed to write a full report for the Iranians on everything he knew from his time with the C.I.A.

“I will turn over to you all the documents and videos that I have from my training course,” the Iraqi man told his Iranian handler, according to a 2014 Iranian intelligence report. “And pictures and identifying features of my fellow trainees and my subordinates.”

The C.I.A. declined to comment.

Iranian spies, Iraqi officials say, are everywhere in the south, and the region has long been a beehive of espionage. It was there, in Karbala in late 2014, that an Iraqi military intelligence officer, down from Baghdad, met with an Iranian intelligence official and offered to spy for Iran — and to tell the Iranians whatever he could about American activities in Iraq.

“Iran is my second country and I love it,” the Iraqi official told the Iranian officer, according to one of the cables. In a meeting that lasted more than three hours, the Iraqi told of his devotion to the Iranian system of government, in which clerics rule directly, and his admiration for Iranian movies.

He said he had come with a message from his boss in Baghdad, Lt. Gen. Hatem al-Maksusi, then commander of military intelligence in the Iraqi Ministry of Defense: “Tell them we are at your service. Whatever you need is at their disposal. We are Shiite and have a common enemy.”

General al-Maksusi’s messenger continued, “All of the Iraqi Army’s intelligence — consider it yours.” He told the Iranian intelligence officer about secret targeting software the United States had provided to the Iraqis, and offered to turn it over to the Iranians. “If you have a new laptop, give it to me so I can upload the program onto it,” he said.

And there was more, he said. The United States had also given Iraq a highly sensitive system for eavesdropping on mobile phones, which was run out of the prime minister’s office and the headquarters of Iraqi military intelligence. “I will put at your disposal whatever intelligence about it you want,” he said.

In an interview, General al-Maksusi, disputed saying the things attributed to him in the cables and denied ever working for Iran. He praised Iran for its help in the fight against the Islamic State, but said he had also maintained a close relationship with the United States. “I worked for Iraq and did not work for any other state,” he said. “I was not the intelligence director for the Shiites, but I was intelligence director for all of Iraq.”

When asked about the cable, a former American official said the United States had become aware of the Iraqi military intelligence officer’s ties to Iran and had limited his access to sensitive information.

‘The Americans’ candidate’

By late 2014, the United States was once again pouring weapons and soldiers into Iraq as it began battling the Islamic State. Iran, too, had an interest in defeating the militants. As ISIS took control of the west and the north, young Iraqi men traveled across the deserts and marshes of the south by the busload, heading to Iran for military training.

Some within the American and Iranian governments believed the two rivals should coordinate their efforts against a common enemy. But Iran, as the leaked cables make clear, also viewed the increased American presence as a threat and a “cover” to gather intelligence about Iran.

“What is happening in the sky over Iraq shows the massive level of activity of the coalition,” one Iranian officer wrote. “The danger for the Islamic Republic of Iran’s interests represented by their activity must be taken seriously.”

The rise of ISIS was at the same time driving a wedge between the Obama administration and a large swath of the Iraqi political class. Mr. Obama had pushed for the ouster of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki as a condition for renewed American military support. He believed Mr. al-Maliki’s draconian policies and crackdowns on Iraqi Sunnis had helped lead to the rise of the militants.

2014 Iraqi security forces inspect the bodies of Islamic State militants after clashes in Jurf al-Sakhar, south of Baghdad. Associated Press

Mr. al-Maliki, who had lived in exile in Iran in the 1980s, was a favorite of Tehran’s. His replacement, the British-educated Haider al-Abadi, was seen as more friendly to the West and less sectarian. Facing the uncertainty of a new prime minister, Hassan Danaiefar, then Iran’s ambassador, called a secret meeting of senior staffers at the Iranian Embassy, a hulking, fortified structure just outside Baghdad’s Green Zone.

As the meeting progressed, it became clear the Iranians had little cause to worry about the new Iraqi government. Mr. Al-Abadi was dismissed as “a British man,” and “the Americans’ candidate,” but the Iranians believed they had plenty of other ministers in their pocket.

One by one, Danaiefar went down the list of cabinet members, describing their relationships to Iran.

Ibrahim al-Jafari — who had previously served as Iraqi prime minister and by late 2014 was the foreign minister — was, like Mr. Mahdi, identified as having a “special relationship” with Iran. In an interview, Mr. al-Jafari did not deny that he had close relations with Iran, but said he had always dealt with foreign countries based on the interests of Iraq.

Iran counted on the loyalty of many lesser cabinet members as well.

The report said the ministers of municipalities, communications and human rights “are in complete harmony and at one with us and are our people.” The environment minister, it said, “works with us, although he is Sunni.” The transportation minister — Bayan Jabr, who had led the Iraqi Interior Ministry at a time when hundreds of prisoners were tortured to death with electric drills or summarily shot by Shiite death squads — was deemed to be “very close” to Iran. When it came to Iraq’s education minister, the report says, “we will have no problem with him.”

The former ministers of municipalities, communications and human rights were all members of the Badr Organization, a political and military group established by Iran in the 1980s to oppose Saddam Hussein. The former minister of municipalities denied having a close relationship with Iran; the former human rights minister acknowledged being close to Iran, and praised Iran for helping Shiite Iraqis during Mr. Hussein’s dictatorship, and for help defeating the Islamic State. The former minister of communications said that he served Iraq, not Iran, and that he maintained relationships with diplomats from many countries; the former minister of education said that he had not been supported by Iran, and that he served at the request of Prime Minister al-Abadi. The former environment minister could not be reached for comment.

Iran’s dominance over Iraqi politics is vividly shown in one important episode from the fall of 2014, when Baghdad was a city at the center of a multinational maelstrom. The Syrian civil war was raging to the west, Islamic State militants had seized almost a third of Iraq and American troops were heading back to the region to confront the growing crisis.

Against this chaotic backdrop, Mr. Jabr, then the transportation minister, welcomed General Suleimani, the Quds Force commander, to his office. General Suleimani had come to ask a favor: Iran needed access to Iraqi airspace to fly planeloads of weapons and other supplies to support the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad in its fight against American-backed rebels.

It was a request that placed Mr. Jabr at the center of the longstanding rivalry between the United States and Iran. Obama administration officials had been lobbying hard to get the Iraqis to stop Iranian flights through their airspace, but face to face with the Quds chief, Iraq’s transportation minister found it impossible to refuse.

General Suleimani, Mr. Jabr recalled, “came to me and requested that we permit Iranian airplanes to use Iraqi air space to pass on to Syria,” according to one of the cables. The transportation minister did not hesitate, and General Suleimani appeared to be pleased. “I put my hands on my eyes and said, ‘On my eyes! As you wish!’” Mr. Jabr told the intelligence ministry officer. “Then he got up and approached me and kissed my forehead.”

Mr. Jabr confirmed the meeting with General Suleimani, but said the flights from Iran to Syria carried humanitarian supplies and religious pilgrims traveling to Syria to visit holy sites, not weapons and military supplies to aid Mr. Assad as American officials believed.

Meanwhile, Iraqi officials known to have a relationship with the United States came under special scrutiny, and Iran took measures to counter American influence. Indeed, many of the files show that as top American diplomats met behind closed doors with their Iraqi counterparts in Baghdad, their conversations were routinely reported back to the Iranians.

2017 Iraqis walk past a poster of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, in Diyala. Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times

Throughout 2014 and 2015, as a new Iraqi government settled in, the American ambassador, Stuart Jones, met often with Salim al-Jabouri, who was speaker of the Iraqi Parliament until last year. Mr. al-Jabouri, although he is Sunni, was known to have a close relationship with Iran, but the files now reveal that one of his top political advisers — identified as Source 134832 — was an Iranian intelligence asset. “ am present in his office on a daily basis and carefully follow his contacts with the Americans,” the source told his Iranian handler. Mr. al-Jabouri, in an interview, said he did not believe that anyone on his staff had worked as an agent for Iran, and that he fully trusted his aides. (Mr. Jones declined to comment.)

The source urged the Iranians to develop closer ties to Mr. al-Jabouri, to blunt American efforts to nurture a new class of younger Sunni leaders in Iraq and perhaps bring about reconciliation between Sunnis and Shias. The source warned that Iran should act to keep the Parliament speaker from “slipping into a pro-American position, since one of Salim al-Jabouri’s characteristics is credulousness and making hasty decisions.”

Another report reveals that Nechervan Barzani, then the prime minister of Kurdistan, met with top American and British officials and Mr. al-Abadi, the Iraqi prime minister, in Baghdad in December 2014, and then went almost immediately to meet with an Iranian official to tell him everything. Through a spokesman, Mr. Barzani said he did not recall meeting with any Iranian officials at the time, and described the cable as “baseless and unfounded.” He said he “absolutely denies” telling the Iranians details about his conversations with American and British diplomats.

Sometimes, the Iranians also saw trade value in the information they received from their Iraqi sources.

One report from the al-Jabouri adviser revealed that the United States was interested in gaining access to a rich natural gas field in Akkas, near Iraq’s border with Syria. The source explained that the Americans might eventually try to export the natural gas to Europe, a major market for Russian natural gas. Intrigued, the intelligence ministry officer, in a cable to Tehran, wrote, “It is recommended that the aforementioned information be used in exchange with the Russians and Syria.” The cable was written just as Russia was significantly stepping up its involvement in Syria, and as Iran continued its military buildup there, in support of President al-Assad.

And although Iran was initially suspicious of Mr. al-Abadi’s allegiances, a report written a few months after his rise to the premiership suggested that he was quite willing to have a confidential relationship with Iranian intelligence. A January 2015 report details a private meeting between al-Abadi and an intelligence ministry officer known as Boroujerdi, held in the prime minister’s office “without the presence of a secretary or a third person.”

During the meeting, Boroujerdi homed in on Iraq’s Sunni-Shia divide, probing Mr. al-Abadi’s feelings on perhaps the most sensitive subject in Iraqi politics. “Today, the Sunnis find themselves in the worst possible circumstances and have lost their self-confidence,” the intelligence officer opined, according to the cable. “The Sunnis are vagrants, their cities are destroyed and an unclear future awaits them, while the Shias can retrieve their self-confidence.”

Iraq’s Shia were “at a historical turning point,” Boroujerdi continued. The Iraqi government and Iran could “take advantage of this situation.”

According to the cable, the prime minister expressed his “complete agreement.” Mr. Abadi declined to comment.

 

2018 Volunteers collect bodies in Mosul, Iraq. Ivor Prickett for The New York Times

‘Sweetness into bitterness’

Ever since the start of the Iraq War in 2003, Iran has put itself forward as the protector of Iraq’s Shiites, and General Suleimani, more than anyone else, has employed the dark arts of espionage and covert military action to ensure that Shiite power remains ascendant. But it has come at the cost of stability, with Sunnis perennially disenfranchised and looking to other groups, like the Islamic State, to protect them.

A 2014 massacre of Sunnis in the farming community of Jurf al-Sakhar was a vivid example of the kinds of sectarian atrocities committed by armed groups loyal to Iran’s Quds Force that had alarmed the United States throughout the Iraq War, and undermined efforts at reconciliation. As the field reports make clear, some of the Americans’ concerns were shared by the Iranian intelligence ministry. That signaled divisions within Iran over its Iraq policies between more moderate elements under President Hassan Rouhani and militant factions like the Revolutionary Guards.

Date: 2014-11-23

منطقه عمومی جرف صخر کاملا از عوامل تروریست پاکسازی و حتی خانواده ها نیز ازآنجا کوچانده شده اند و منازل توسط نیروهای نظامی تخریب شده و باقیمانده آنها تخریب خواهند گردید ودر برخی مناطق درختان نخل از ریشه کنده تا سوزانده شوند و امکان حضور تروریستها و پناه گرفتن در میان منازل و درختان میسر نگردد. احشام مردم منطقه (گاو گوسفند) در نقاط مختلف پراکنده شده اند و بدون صاحب مشغول چرا هستند.

The area around Jurf Al-Sakhar has been cleansed of terrorist agents. Their families have been driven away, most of their houses have been destroyed by military forces and the rest will be destroyed. In some places, the palm orchards have been uprooted to be burned to prevent the terrorists from taking shelter among the trees.

The people’s livestock (cows and sheep) have been scattered and are grazing without their owners.

Jurf al-Sakhar, which lies just east of Falluja in the Euphrates River Valley, is lush with orange trees and palm groves. It was overrun by the Islamic State in 2014, giving militants a foothold from which they could launch attacks on the holy cities of Karbala and Najaf.

Jurf al-Sakhar is also important to Iran because it lies on a route Shiite religious pilgrims use to travel to Karbala during Muharram, the monthlong commemoration of the death of Prophet Muhammad’s grandson, Imam Hussein, a revered figure for Shiites.

When Shiite militias supported by Iran drove the militants out of Jurf al-Sakhar in late 2014, the first major victory over the Islamic State, it became a ghost town. It was no longer a threat to the thousands of Shiite pilgrims who would pass by, but Iran’s victory came at a high cost to the town’s Sunni residents. Tens of thousands were displaced, and a local politician, the only Sunni member on the provincial council, was found with a bullet hole through his head.

One cable describes the damage in almost biblical terms. “As a result of these operations,” its author reported, “the area around Jurf al-Sakhar has been cleansed of terrorist agents. Their families have been driven away, most of their houses have been destroyed by military forces and the rest will be destroyed. In some places, the palm orchards have been uprooted to be burned to prevent the terrorists from taking shelter among the trees. The people’s livestock (cows and sheep) have been scattered and are grazing without their owners.”

The Jurf al-Sakhar operation and other bloody actions led by Iran’s proxies and directed by Tehran further alienated Iraq’s Sunni population, according to one report, which notes that “destroying villages and houses, looting the Sunnis’ property and livestock turned the sweetness of these successes” against the Islamic State into “bitterness.” One of the Jurf al-Sakhar cables cast the impact of Shiite militias in particularly stark terms: “In all the areas where the Popular Mobilization Forces go into action, the Sunnis flee, abandoning their homes and property, and prefer to live in tents as refugees or reside in camps.”

The intelligence ministry feared that Iran’s gains in Iraq were being squandered because Iraqis so resented the Shia militias and the Quds Force that sponsored them. Above all, its officers blamed General Suleimani, whom they saw as a dangerous self-promoter using the anti-ISIS campaign as a launching pad for a political career back home in Iran. One report, which states at the top that it is not to be shared with the Quds Force, criticizes the general personally for publicizing his leading role in the military campaign in Iraq by “publishing pictures of himself on different social media sites.”

Doing that had made it obvious that Iran controlled the dreaded Shia militias — a potential gift to its rivals. “This policy of Iran in Iraq,” the report said, “has allowed the Americans to return to Iraq with greater legitimacy. And groups and individuals who had been fighting against the Americans among the Sunnis are now wishing that not only America, but even Israel, would enter Iraq and save Iraq from Iran’s clutches.”

At times, the Iranians sought to counter the ill will generated by their presence in Iraq with soft-power campaigns similar to American battlefield efforts to win “hearts and minds.” Hoping to gain a “propaganda advantage and restore Iran’s image among the people,” Iran devised a plan to send pediatricians and gynecologists to villages in northern Iraq to administer health services, according to one field report. It is not clear, however, if that initiative materialized.

Date: 2014-11-29

ضرورت دارد که حد و حدودی برای جلوگیری از خشونت علیه افراد بی گناه اهل سنت درعراق و اقدامات آقای سلیمانی اندیشیده شود و الی خشونت و درگیری میان شیعه و سنی همچنان ادامه پیدا کرده و در حال حاضر هر گونه اقدامی علیه اهل سنت به حساب ایران نوشته می شود٬ چه ایران مستقیم و غیر مستقیم در آن نقش داشته باشد و یا نقشی در آن نداشته باشد.

We must think about limiting violence against innocent Sunnis in Iraq and limiting Mr. Soleimani’s measures, or else violence and strife between Shiites and Sunnis will continue. Currently, any actions taken against Sunnis will be blamed on Iran, whether Iran had a direct or indirect role in it, or none at all.

Just as often, Iran would use its influence to close lucrative development deals. With Iraq dependent on Iran for military support in the fight against the Islamic State, one cable shows the Quds Force receiving oil and development contracts from Iraq’s Kurds in exchange for weapons and other aid. In the south, Iran was awarded contracts for sewage and water purification by paying a $16 million bribe to a member of Parliament, according to another field report.

2019 Graffiti on a street sign in Najaf, a city in central Iraq. Protesters blacked out the real name — Khomeini Street — and painted in “Revolution Street.” Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Today, Iran is struggling to maintain its hegemony in Iraq, just as the Americans did after the 2003 invasion. Iraqi officials, meanwhile, are increasingly worried that a provocation in Iraq on either side could set off a war between the two powerful countries vying for dominance in their homeland. Against this geopolitical backdrop, Iraqis learned long ago to take a pragmatic approach to the overtures of Iran’s spies — even Sunni Iraqis who view Iran as an enemy.

“Not only doesn’t he believe in Iran, but he doesn’t believe that Iran might have positive intentions toward Iraq,” one Iranian case officer wrote in late 2014, about an Iraqi intelligence recruit described as a Baathist who had once worked for Saddam Hussein and later the C.I.A. “But he is a professional spy and understands the reality of Iran and the Shia in Iraq and will collaborate to save himself.”

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/18/world/middleeast/iran-iraq-spy-cables.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur

[yota691]

Urgent documents .. Political leaders sign important decisions and recommendations

Release date:: 2019-11-18 23:38 • 1470 times read

[yota691]

Abdul Mahdi responds to the recommendations of the meeting of political forces in the house of Hakim

2019-11-19

Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi sent a message to Hakim leader Ammar al-Hakim after a meeting of forces and the signing of a political agreement.

Abdul Mahdi said in his letter that Yass Iraq got a copy of it through private sources:

His Eminence Mr

Peace, mercy and blessings of God

We have followed with great interest your initiative to unify the political forces in response to the call of the Marjaiya and the major reformist protest movement of our noble people.We thank you for all efforts made to come up with points that meet the basic demands of our people and pledge all parties as political forces and legislative, executive and judicial authorities to reach the desired goals in time that has been accurately and clearly defined. I thank you and thank you through all the personalities and forces participating in this historic moment. God bless you and pay your footsteps.

Peace, mercy and blessings of God

your brother

عادل عبد المهدي Free Membership

The political forces held their meeting in the house of the leader of the stream of wisdom, Ammar al-Hakim and attended by 12 political parties, including the coalition victory and Fatah and the two Kurdish parties, with the exception of the Alliance.

[yota691]

Iraqi blocs sign a document reforms give the government and parliament 45 days

November 18, 2019

 

Banners condemning Iran's followers in Iraq

 

 

 

 

Iraqi parties and political blocs, meeting on Monday, signed an agreement to implement a number of measures and decisions, in the face of protests since October 1, and demand the departure of the ruling elite, according to a document published by local media.

The document signed by 12 political entities highlighted the pledge to amend the electoral law to provide equal opportunities for independent candidates, the formation of a new election commission and a broad ministerial reshuffle "on the concepts of quotas."

The signatories urged the government and security agencies to "identify those involved in the kidnapping of demonstrators and continue the effort to discover those involved in hunting and killing demonstrators and targeting the media."

The political blocs gave the government and parliament 45 days to implement the reforms contained in the document.

The signatories to the document represent most of the main currents participating in the government and parliament since 2003, including the Fatah Alliance led by Hadi al-Amiri, and the State of Law coalition led by Nuri al-Maliki.

More than 300 people were killed and thousands more injured during the demonstrations, which began on the first of last October, as a result of the security forces using excessive violence against the demonstrators.

The meeting comes in conjunction with the publication of leaked Iranian documents revealing the extent of Tehran's extensive intervention in Iraq, through spies penetrating into the political, security and military institutions in Iraq.

[yota691]

[southbeach]

Real faith acts.  Thank you people of Iraq.

[yota691]

Abdul-Mahdi: Our priorities are to protect the rights of Iraqis

Monday, November 18, 2019 77

 

Baghdad / morning

 

The Prime Minister, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Adel Abdul Mahdi, said in a speech yesterday at the Defense University for Military Studies that the top priority of the government program is to protect the rights of all Iraqis under the rule of law, security and order, while receiving the US ambassador to Baghdad and the Special Representative of the Secretary. General of the United Nations in Iraq individually. 

Abdul Mahdi said during a speech at the Defense University for Military Studies: Our government program was clear and specific in its objectives to combat terrorism and put weapons under the control of the State and support the capabilities of the armed forces and the use of foreign relations with all neighboring countries according to the participants and to serve security, stability and economic development. Regarding the role of the government program in achieving the national security strategy, he continued by saying that one country is Iraq and the people are the real army of the country.

He also reviewed the developments and challenges faced by Iraq in order to build its military establishment, and united the Iraqi army and people in the war against the Daesh gang and victory over it thanks to the fatwa of jihad and the defense of Iraq and its land and sanctities, as well as the decision to form a law-keeping force trained to deal with and protect peaceful demonstrations, And seek the required constitutional amendments.

The Prime Minister answered questions from attendees of military studies students on security and defense issues related to the government program.

In addition, Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi received in his office yesterday the US Ambassador to Baghdad and the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Iraq. 

During a meeting with US Ambassador Matthew Toller in the presence of US Central Command Commander Patrick White, Abdul Mahdi discussed the development of relations between the two countries and the continuation of joint cooperation to fight the remains of the terrorist group and training Iraqi forces.

During his meeting with the Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Jenin Hennes Blaschaert, the Prime Minister also discussed the government's efforts to meet the demands of the demonstrators, especially the electoral law, as well as cooperation between Iraq and the United Nations and supporting stability in the country.

[Butifldrm]

 

2019/11/18 23:59

• Number of readings 243
• Section: Iraq
•  

Victory: Our signature on the political blocs document is conditioned on the formation of a new government

Baghdad / Obelisk: The victory coalition announced that its signature and signing of the document of the political blocs on 18.11.2019 came conditional on the formation of a new government.

statement

Victory Coalition announces to the public opinion that its signature and signature of the document of political blocs on 18/11/2019 is conditioned on the formation of a new government that will implement these commitments and hold early elections after the amendment of the election law and reform of the Electoral Commission and the participation of popular activities as well as a clear condemnation of the killing and wounding of peaceful demonstrators and kidnapping . We call on everyone to show solidarity to bring the country out of its crisis in the interests of the people and the safety of the state.

Office Media
Coalition Victory

http://almasalah.com/ar/news/182425/النصر-توقيعنا-على-وثيقة-الكتل-السياسية-مشروط-بتشكيل-حكومة-جديدة
11/18/2019

[Butifldrm]

I'm sure the US State Departments (Pompeo's Message to the World) lit a fire under the corrupts arses to get this done!

 

 

 

 

2019/11/18 22:25

• Number Of Hits 190
• Section: Iraq
•  

State Department: Sanctions will be imposed on corrupt individuals who steal the wealth of Iraqis

The United States will impose sanctions on corrupt individuals who steal Iraqi wealth, the State Department said Monday.

"The United States will impose sanctions on corrupt individuals who steal the wealth of Iraqis," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters.
 
"We will use our capabilities to hold these people accountable."
Agencies 
http://almasalah.com/ar/news/182424/الخارجية-الاميركية-ستنفرض-عقوبات-على-فاسدين-يسرقون-ثروات-العراقيين

[yota691]

Iraqi political forces give the government 45 days to start implementing reforms

© REUTERS / KHALID AL-MOUSILY

ARAB WORLD

23:30 18.11.2019(Updated 00:12 19.11.2019)

Follow us via

Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi's government has been given 45 days to start implementing government reforms, threatening to withdraw confidence from the government or hold early elections if reforms are not implemented. 
Baghdad - Sputnik. The Iraqi political forces during the meeting held at the home of the President of the "National Wisdom Movement" Ammar al-Hakim (the absence of the alliance led by Muqtada al-Sadr, "according to a statement issued by the meeting" the Iraqi government to implement the promised steps of reform and service For its practical steps, the implementation will begin within a short period not exceeding the end of this year ie 45 days. "

 

© AP PHOTO / BURHAN OZBILICI

Iraq .. Adel Abdul Mahdi: Can not accept any weapons outside the legitimacy of the state

The meeting also issued a set of recommendations and decisions, most notably, "the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and the competent security services should identify those involved in the kidnapping of demonstrators and continue the effort to discover those involved in hunting and killing demonstrators."

 She stressed that "the preservation of the lives of citizens and the structure of the state and its democratic political system and the consolidation of the principle of peaceful transfer of power through constitutional mechanisms , is the reward that everyone meets, and overcome and collapse of the red line."

Since early October, there have been widespread protests calling for better living conditions, fighting corruption, dismissing the government, dissolving parliament, and holding early elections.These protests have seen more than 300 demonstrators and security men killed and more than 15,000 injured.

The turmoil ended the relative calm that has engulfed Iraq since it declared victory over ISIS (banned in Russia) in 2017.

Protesters demand the overthrow of a political class they consider corrupt and captive of foreign interests. Protesters resorted to methods of civil disobedience such as strikes, obstruction of traffic and the closure of ports and oil installations.

 

[yota691]

Are the repercussions of the rejection of «Iran's influence» in Iraq and Lebanon ... extends to Yemen?

 

Tuesday, November 22, 2019

 

 

Protesters amid fires and smoke in Basra (AFP)

Riyadh: Abdul Hadi Habtoor

Yemeni officials and analysts question whether the uprising in Iran, Iraq and Lebanon could spread to the feet of the ruling Houthi group in Sanaa, which is backed by the Iranian regime and its regional tools such as Lebanon's Hezbollah and some Iraqi sectarian factions.

They believe that Yemen will not be immune from the rebellions of the popular uprising in the three countries, likely that the Yemenis will follow this revolution against Iranian sectarian policies soon, and not remain idle. They also assert that the Iranian Houthi militias are living in anxiety and anxiety about what they are hiding in the coming days, especially as they see the project of their sponsors and supporters of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard crumbling, not only in the Arab countries under their control, but in the home of the mullahs' regime itself.

According to a government official, Iran is reaping the benefits of its policies in the region. "The popular protests that swept most Iranian provinces after the uprisings in Iraq and Lebanon underline the predicament of the mullahs' regime in Iran," said Information Minister Muammar al-Iryani. Al-Iryani warned in remarks through the Yemeni news agency Saba that Yemen will not be immune from the rebellions of the popular uprising witnessed by Iran, Iraq and Lebanon.

Houthi split over political solution

Dr. Najib Ghallab, a former political science professor at Sana'a University, explains that all the signs of the revolution in Yemen are in the Houthi group, Iran's proxy in Yemen. He said: «Houthi group reached a state of terror because of the uprising in Iran, Iraq and Lebanon, and fear of the transmission of this to Yemen». He told Asharq Al-Awsat that the Houthi movement is divided on itself in terms of a political solution, as the most concerned parties demand a political solution to save it from any coming revolution, while the extremist party or those they call the state thieves only want the situation to continue. .

Ghalab predicted that "the revolution in Yemen, if it happens, will be more severe than Iraq and Lebanon, and the capital of the Houthis." But the political science professor warns that "the Houthi system has its ideological, nervous and racial roots inside Yemen, and that the state of imams is based on the concept of establishing state rule, which supports the extremist wing to resist any revolution." He added that «Abdul Malik al-Houthi himself says he will resist until the Day of Resurrection to stabilize his rule. The existence of a revolution does not mean that the aspirant system for establishing the state will be greatly weakened ... The fall of the velayat-e faghih in Iran may prompt the Yemeni Imami Party to focus on establishing a state in which the Yemenis face a decisive choice, which may further aggravate the Houthi group at this stage. Upcoming ».

Events push Houthi to retreat

Abdul Malik al-Mikhlafi, an adviser to the Yemeni president and former foreign minister, said that "the Houthis are currently living in a state of anxiety and anticipation, as the Iranian project is facing a real confrontation in the region." He said in an interview with «Middle East», «the Houthi project was based on the beginning of the expansion of the Iranian aggressive project against the Arab nation. They are now on the lookout for what's happening. Defeating the Iranian project in Lebanon and Iraq will cause the Houthis to consider retreating too much. They cannot be far from their Arab surroundings. ” According to al-Mikhlafi, "the changes and the situation facing the Iranian project supporting the Houthi, including the uprisings in Iraq and Lebanon, and if the confrontation moves to Yemen, the Houthi could retreat significantly from his project, which has so far relied on Iranian support."

For his part, agrees Yemeni political writer Hamdan al-Ali, that Yemen will not be immune from what is happening in Iraq, Lebanon and Iran itself, saying: «The popular uprisings in Iraq and Lebanon are already against the tools of Iran in the region, and Houthi part of it, they are mercenaries of Iran in Yemen» . "There is a real societal desire to interact with what happened in these countries," he said. "The problem is that the Houthis are using excessive violence against their opponents, even though they are weaker than Iran's tools in Iraq, but they still act as gangsters." "The Houthis are in an abnormal state of concern about the collapse of their intellectual expansion in the region, which paves the way for their collapse."

[6ly410]

US Threatens to Sanction Iraqi "Corrupt Individuals"

 

BasNews 18/11/2019 - 23:58 Published in Iraq

 

 

http://www.basnews.com/index.php/en/news/iraq/561953

 

ERBIL - The United States threatened on Monday to sanction the Iraqi "corrupt individuals" without taking their rank into consideration, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said.

"We will not stand idle while the corrupt officials make the Iraqi people suffer," Pompeo told reporters. "The United States will use our legal authority to sanction corrupt individuals that are stealing Iraqis’ wealth and those killing and wounding peaceful protesters."

He further added that Washington supports the Iraqi protesters who "strive" for a better Iraq and against Iran's influence in the country.

"We support the Iraqi people as they strive for a prosperous Iraq that is free of corruption and Iranian malign influence," Pompeo said.

The US top diplomat additionally pointed out that Washington had made it clear that the Iraqi leaders "must" protect the human rights of the people of Iraq.

"We’ve stated clearly that Iraq’s leaders must protect human rights as Iraqis lift their voices to secure a flourishing democracy."

Since early October, over 330 people have been killed in clashes between the protesters and security forces, while more than 16,000 others were injured.

Edited November 19, 2019 by 6ly410

[horsesoldier]

Dang .... FULL COURT PRESS is ON !!!! After the Epic Big Squeezer the White House continues to put to Iran, these corrupt criminal Iraqi politicians should take heed....if they were smart.

[3n1]

power to the people .......

[fancy]

4 hours ago, Butifldrm said:

I'm sure the US State Departments (Pompeo's Message to the World) lit a fire under the corrupts arses to get this done!

 

 

 

 

2019/11/18 22:25

• Number Of Hits 190
• Section: Iraq
•  

State Department: Sanctions will be imposed on corrupt individuals who steal the wealth of Iraqis

The United States will impose sanctions on corrupt individuals who steal Iraqi wealth, the State Department said Monday.

"The United States will impose sanctions on corrupt individuals who steal the wealth of Iraqis," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters.
 
"We will use our capabilities to hold these people accountable."
Agencies 
http://almasalah.com/ar/news/182424/الخارجية-الاميركية-ستنفرض-عقوبات-على-فاسدين-يسرقون-ثروات-العراقيين

Light that fire, the people are fed up they've had enough. If this works it'll bring us closer to what we've been waiting for. Get Iran out of Iraq. I don't think I ever really recognize that Iran had such a HUGE  influence in Iraq

[yota691]

Ministerial reshuffle expected in Iraq

Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi

 19 November 2019 12:30 PM

Mubasher: Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi will present a cabinet reshuffle, a spokesman for the prime minister's office in Iraq said on Tuesday.

Al-Hadithi added, according to the Iraqi News Agency (INA), that Mahdi will submit a list of ministers to the ministries of service and economic and concerned in the file of reforms and respond to the demands of the demonstrators at the level of living and service.

Al-Hadithi added that some candidates have been selected and there is a complete selection for others according to purely professional considerations and the Prime Minister's convictions of the capabilities and capabilities of the new candidates, away from the interventions and influences of political blocs and their nominations.

The spokesman for the Prime Minister's Office, that the Prime Minister will soon go to the House of Representatives to put forward his desire for the reshuffle.

He explained that Abdul-Mahdi will ask the House of Representatives to support this trend to develop a new mechanism with regard to the process of selecting new ministers away from political quotas or partisan loyalties, which prevailed over the selection mechanism in previous governments.

[yota691]

Urgent his office: Abdul Mahdi will submit to parliament a cabinet reshuffle he chose according to his convictions

Release date:: 2019/11/19 11:57 • 397 times read

BAGHDAD: The official spokesman for the Office of Prime Minister Saad al-Hadithi, on Tuesday, that Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi will submit reforms and ministerial reforms.

Al-Hadithi said in a press statement that "the Prime Minister will present a list of ministers to the ministries of service and economic and concerned in the file of reforms and respond to the demands of the demonstrators at the level of living and service."
He pointed out that "some of the candidates have been selected and there is an update for the selection of others according to purely professional considerations and the Prime Minister's convictions of the capabilities and possibilities of new candidates for the consultation, away from the interventions and influences of political blocs and nominations."
He added that "the Prime Minister will soon go to the House of Representatives to put forward his desire for a cabinet reshuffle," and called on "the House of Representatives to support this trend to develop a new mechanism with regard to the process of Alastzar away from political quotas or partisan and bloc loyalties, which prevailed over the selection mechanism in previous governments."

[yota691]

Deputy: Do not fear the demonstrators that they want to build a country free from the past and its complexity

Date: 2019/11/19 10:27 • 115 times read

(Baghdad: Euphrates News) Member of the House of Representatives, Aras Habib, not to fear the demonstrators because they "want to build a country free from the past and its complexity."

Habib said in a statement received (Euphrates News) a copy of it, "the awareness held by the majority of youth demonstrations as young as 20 years is very remarkable."
"Those who were mostly born after the change are the ones who have long bet on all my conversations and statements. Don't be afraid of them. They want to build a country free of the past decade and its complexity."

[yota691]

His office: Abdul-Mahdi will go to Parliament to ask his desire for the reshuffle

Political | 11:53 - 19/11/2019

 

 

 

 

BAGHDAD - Mawazine News
revealed Saad al-Hadithi, spokesman for the Office of Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi, on Tuesday, that the latter will go to Parliament to put forward his desire for a cabinet reshuffle.
Al-Hadithi said, according to the Iraqi News Agency, "the prime minister will soon go to the House of Representatives to put forward his desire for the reshuffle."
He added, "Abdul-Mahdi calls on the House of Representatives to support this trend to develop a new mechanism with regard to the process of Alastzar away from political quotas or partisan and bloc loyalties that had overcome the selection mechanism in previous governments."

[yota691]

The widening of the dispute between Barham Saleh and Abdul Mahdi

Political | 03:15 - 19/11/2019

 

 

 

 

BAGHDAD - Mawazine News
on the impact of the demonstrations in Baghdad and the southern provinces, and the continuation of the general strike, local Iraqi media reports have confirmed the widening of the dispute between the Presidents of the Republic and the ministers Barham Saleh and Adel Abdul Mahdi.
According to political sources revealed by local media, "an unprecedented controversy prevailed between Saleh and Abdul Mahdi, through official letters that preceded a political meeting attended by Saleh and not attended by Abdul Mahdi, and that Saleh and a letter to Abdul Mahdi, talked about violations, and called on him to overcome the solution Security and stick to other solutions. "
According to the sources, "Saleh also warned Abdul Mahdi of the reactions of the international community, and called on him to stop the kidnappings and the use of gas bombs that caused the deaths of demonstrators."
The sources confirmed that "Abdul-Mahdi replied to Saleh by a message in which he stressed that" the presidency is not safeguarded or irresponsible, and that all meetings were held in the presence of the President of the Republic and under his auspices and at his headquarters, calling on him to participate by assuming responsibilities and not dealing with metadata. "