Author: garykent

Iraq Net reports that the UN Security Council has agreed to extend the mandate of multinational forces in Iraq “until the completion of the political process.” Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari called on the United States and other countries to accelerate efforts to help the new government get on its feet: “We need the cooperation of all our neighbours, of the international community, to accelerate this, the process of training, of equipment, of assistance, because that will shorten the mandate of the (multinational force). “We need the continued engagement of the United States in this process. For us this is … Continue reading Iraq UN mandate extended

A decade ago, maybe even five years ago, the story I’m about to tell could never have happened.

The Institute of War and Peace Reporting has launched a important new project – the Women’s Reporting and Dialogue Programme. To receive emails, please subscribe here. IWPR Director Anthony Boden explains the new venture.

Go here here to listen to a discussion between Thomas Carothers and Marina Ottaway editors of Uncharted Journey, a new collection of essays on democracy-building in the Middle East. (AJ)

Iraq Directory is reporting that “Japan will spend $100 million to build a power plant in the southern Iraqi city of Samawa where some 600 Japanese troops provide humanitarian assistance. (AJ)

Scott Peterson in The Christian Science Monitor writes on the fight by Iraqi women to defeat moves to Islamisise Iraqi society.

Go here for CNN interview with Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari who talks about the regional autocracies that fear the new democratic Iraq will work. Yet another case of the anti-democrats understanding better than the democrats what is at stake in Iraq.

Read ‘The End of Secularism in Iraq’ at the Open Democracy site. (AJ)

A major military corporation is now producing cranes and electrical cables instead of missiles and bombs. (AJ)