Free Republic

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iraq has signed preliminary deals worth billions of dollars with General Electric Co and Siemens for equipment to almost double electricity generation capacity, an energy official said on Saturday. The deals with GE, Siemens and a third company would be worth a total of $7 billion to $8 billion, Iraq's Electricity Minister Karim Waheed told Reuters. Years of war, sanctions and neglect have battered Iraq's power grid and the country suffers chronic power shortages. The capital Baghdad receives only a few hours of electricity a day. The deals would mark a big step in the country's reconstruction,...

China has secured Baghdad's first post-Saddam Hussein oil deal by reviving a 1997 concession to exploit reserves on the al-Ahdab field south of the capital. The two countries are expected to formally sign an agreement later this month that will earn the state-controlled China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) a fixed price for every barrel it produces in Iraq. While China opposed the Iraq war and stood back from post-war rebuilding, Beijing has quietly outflanked its global rivals to grab a large slice of Iraq's oil industry. The pioneers of its overseas quest for fuel are already exploring vast tracts in...

FORWARD OPERATING BASE RUSTAMIYAH, Iraq, Sept. 4, 2008 – In another indication of a return to normalcy in eastern Baghdad, more than 90 organizations gathered Aug. 29 and 30 at the Palestine Hotel in the Iraqi capital’s Rusafa district for the 9 Nissan District Business Trade Show. An Iraqi businessman shows Turkish artificial grass, which is one of his company’s products, during the 9 Nissan District Business Trade Show at the Palestine Hotel in Karadah, Iraq, Aug. 30, 2008. More than 90 organizations, including more than 80 businesses, gathered for the event Aug. 29 and 30. U.S. Army photo...

Iraq and China have agreed on the terms of a $3 billion oil service contract, the Iraqi oil minister said Wednesday, announcing his country's first major oil contract with a foreign company since the fall of Saddam Hussein. The oil minister, Hussain al- Shahristani, warned that time was running out for big Western oil companies, which have pressed for years for Iraqi contracts, to seal even short-term deals that had been expected to mark their return to Iraq, which has the world's third-largest oil reserves after Saudi Arabia and Iran. Iraq and the Chinese state-run oil company, CNPC, have agreed...

Link only - Pack your bags for Baghdad? Iraq looks to tourism

The normalization of Iraq, which would generate 250 billion dollars in oil revenues, would boost Turkey's trade volume with this country to 30 billion dollars, Turkey's Trade Minister Kursad Tuzmen said on Sunday. The establishment of stability in Iraq would earn Turkey a neighbor with the ability to generate $250 billion in oil revenues, Tuzmen told the Anatolian Agency. Tuzmen said exports and the construction services Turkey provided to Iraq would be boosted and the transportation sector would also benefit as the revenue of the country increased. "Had Iraq normalized the business volume between Turkey and Iraq would rise to...

Naseb Saad Hasan Altememy, holds up a can of future profits for his company’s recycling center site at a refuse collection site at Joint Base Balad, Iraq. The recycling center, which will provide jobs to local Iraqis, will assist current efforts to sort through daily garbage collection on post for recyclables. Photo by Sgt. Robert G. Cooper III. BALAD — A war can be messy, literally. From the daily trash collections conducted by roving garbage trucks to amassing scrap metals born from the aftermath of battle, waste management is a serious business for Coalition forces in Iraq.And that business is...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - German Economy Minister Michael Glos held talks with Iraqi officials in Baghdad on Saturday, becoming the first German cabinet minister to visit since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Germany opposed the invasion but his visit is the latest sign many foreign capitals are ready to upgrade ties with Iraq, where violence has fallen to a four-year low. "The German minister confirmed his country's keenness to improve political and economic ties with Iraq and that German companies are absolutely ready to rebuild Iraq," a statement from Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salih's office said. The statement urged German and...

BASRA, Iraq, June 20, 2008 – The provincial reconstruction team for Iraq’s Basra province, along with the Gulf Region South district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the United Nations Development Program concluded a two-day budget execution support workshop June 18 at the international airport here. The event provided a clear understanding of how the international community can support the provincial governor’s office and technical directorates for the design and implementation of projects for the rest of the year, said Army Maj. Daniel George, a PRT engineer assigned from Gulf Region South’s...

(Newser) – European and Asian investors are taking advantage of the recently stabilized Iraqi business climate, USA Today reports. US firms still regard Iraq as too dangerous to invest in, but that attitude may cost them the best opportunities. The firms “who are getting in on the ground floor are not American," says a Pentagon official. "It's ironic." Iraq has attracted $500 million in foreign investment just this year. Many of the countries with the largest business presence—such as France, Russia and Turkey—did not take part in the initial invasion. Americans' cold feet perplex some. Says a Washington-based Iraqi official:...

We Won!The rest of the world apparently doesn't read the U.S. Mainstream Media. Or listen to Congressional Democrats, Harry Reid or Code Pink, either. Companies from around the world are rushing into Iraq to do business, due to the improved security climate in that country. Over a half-billion dollars worth of investments from countries that, in many cases, didn't support the U.S. in its efforts to improve Iraq's security. European and Asian companies are beating their American rivals into Iraq now that security has improved the investment climate, Iraq and U.S. officials say. "It's starting to turn … and the...

BAGHDAD, June 6, 2008 – When Army Capt. Shawn Carbone first took a good look at the economy in Iraq’s southern Baghdad province, he found it similar to his studies of America during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Hussen Jowd, a butcher in Arab Jabour, Iraq, serves a sandwich at his newly renovated butcher shop and food stand. Jowd received micro-grants that enabled him to increase his stock and expand his business. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Kevin Stabinsky  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. "Most of the historically strong businesses were gone," said Carbone, economics team leader...

BAGHDAD, May 28, 2008 – More than 70 Iraqi business owners gathered in the Babylon Hotel on the Karadah Peninsula in southeastern Baghdad for the inaugural Rebuilding Karadah Expo and Conference, May 23-24. Karadah district business owners display their products to Iraqi patrons during the Rebuilding Karadah Expo and Conference in Baghdad’s Babylon Hotel, May 23, 2008. More than 70 businesses took part in the Iraqi Chamber of Commerce and Industry event, and officials estimate more than 2,000 visitors attended the expo. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Jeremy Todd, Multinational Division Baghdad  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Entrepreneurs...

Iraq's financial free ride may be over. After five years, Republicans and Democrats seem to have found common ground on at least one aspect of the war. From the fiercest war foes to the most steadfast Bush supporters, they are looking at Iraq's surging oil income and saying Baghdad should start picking up the tab, particularly for rebuilding hospitals, roads, power lines and the rest of the shattered country. "I think the American people are growing weary not only of the war, but they are looking at why Baghdad can't pay more of these costs. And the answer is they...

The continuing military operations in the oil hub Basra have slowed down Iraq's crude-oil production and exports from southern oil fields, an Iraqi official with the South Oil Company and a shipping agent said Thursday. Meanwhile, a bomb Thursday struck the key Zubair-1 crude pipeline -- the largest pipeline to the Basra export terminal -- and will likely affect exports "heavily," the South Oil Company official said.

BAGHDAD - Iraq's crude oil exports in January inched up to 59.6 million barrels, a six per cent increase from the previous month, the Oil Ministry said Tuesday. Iraq's average production was 2.4 million barrels per day in January while exports stood at an average of 1.92 million barrels per day, the ministry's figures showed. December's exports averaged 1.81 million barrels per day. But there was still an enormous difference in output between the southern port of Basra, which exported an average of 1.54 million barrels daily, and the northern city of Kirkuk, which exported nearly 380,000 barrels per day....

Iraqis received a rare piece of good news this week, when the International Monetary Fund predicted that the country would see an overall growth rate of 7 percent in the coming year. The country will benefit from oil prices reaching record highs and the forecast that Iraq's own oil production would go up by 200,000 barrels a day, to a daily output of 2.2 million barrels, the IMF predicted. The optimism is visible everywhere on the streets of Baghdad. The shops are full of produce and electronics and clothes and dry goods. People are out with their families, and they...

IMF Predicts Good News for Iraq's Economy, but Growth Depends on Security Iraqis received a rare piece of good news this week, when the International Monetary Fund predicted that the country would see an overall growth rate of 7 percent in the coming year. The country will benefit from oil prices reaching record highs and the forecast that Iraq's own oil production would go up by 200,000 barrels a day, to a daily output of 2.2 million barrels, the IMF predicted. The optimism is visible everywhere on the streets of Baghdad. The shops are full of produce and electronics and...

House prices on the up and increased banking business are not readily associated with Iraq. Yet as Humphrey Hawksley reports, there are entrepreneurs who see good times in the horizon. "This is the entrance hall," said Naimah Abdul Jabbah, throwing open a huge pair of wooden double doors. "How much?", I asked. "$1m. Maybe some negotiation. But $1m, I reckon." He turned to my interpreter to confirm the dollar exchange rate to the dinar, because in recent months Iraq's currency has been creeping up in value. Business playground Naimah, in his early 40s, is a leading Iraqi estate agent. He...

BAGHDAD, Dec. 7, 2007 – Troops from Battery A, 3rd Battalion, 82nd Field Artillery Regiment, and a civil affairs team from 422nd Civil Affairs Battalion handed out $10,000 in micro-grant funds to an Iraqi small business and a home for mentally handicapped children. A baker whisks hot bread out of an oven while troops from the 3rd Battalion, 82nd Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, get ready to hand $5,000 to the bakery's owner as part of a micro-grant program in Baghdad’s Qadisiyah neighborhood, Dec. 1, 2007. Photo by Spc. Alexis Harrison, USA  (Click photo for...

Navy Capt. John Dillender (right), economics and industrial advisor for Baghdad 5 Embedded Provincial Reconstruction Team, which operates north of the Iraqi capital with the 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, mimics the sanding technique used by a furniture factory worker near Taji, Iraq Nov. 11. The Henning, Tenn. native helped facilitate (200) pieces of furniture purchased from the State Company for Furniture Industry-Baghdad to be delivered to area schools. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Shejal Pulivarti, 1st BCT, 1st Cav. Div. PAO. CAMP TAJI — The State Company for Furniture Industry-Baghdad, located near Taji, recently filled its first...

New Berth Increases Umm Qasr Port Capacity Army engineers oversee berth project that was designed and built by Iraqis. By Mohammed AliwiU.S. Army Corps of EngineersGulf Region South District BASRAH, Iraq, Sept. 28, 2007 — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has turned control over the newly completed “roll-on/roll-off� berth at Umm Qasr Port to the Iraqi Port Authority. "The Iraqi people can be proud of this project because it is theirs alone."Rebecca Wingfield, project engineer Known as a RoRo because it serves “roll-on/roll-off� ships that share the acronym, the $2.7 million berth project doubles the number of the...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 26, 2007 – New buildings constructed under the guidance of coalition forces are sparking prosperity for Iraqi citizens, a senior U.S. military engineer in Iraq said today. “It’s a concept of ownership,” Navy Capt. Joe Hedges told online journalists and “bloggers” during a conference call from Baghdad. “We’re using Iraqi funds to build Iraqi facilities.” Hedges is assistant chief of staff for the engineering directorate of Multinational Security Transition Command Iraq. His team is currently working to build military bases, barracks, airfields, schools and a hospital on 12 different sites in Iraq. “I’m excited,” Hedges said. “I think...

Article can not be posted due to publishers copyright complainClick here to read the article

WASHINGTON, Sept. 4, 2007 – A task force designed to bolster Iraq’s industry has made “measurable progress,” placing scores of Iraqi workers in sustainable jobs since the program’s June 2006 inception, the deputy secretary of defense said today. Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England leads off a press briefing on steps being taken to improve the economy of Iraq in the Pentagon , Sept. 4, 2007. Joining England for the briefing were Iraq's Minister of Industry and Minerals Fawzi Hariri, left, and Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Business Transformation Paul Brinkley. Defense Dept. photo by R. D. Ward  (Click...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2007 – Recent strides in Iraq’s economic development, including the reopening of a flour mill last week, are occurring as Iraqi and coalition forces disrupt al Qaeda and other terrorist elements, a senior military spokesman in Iraq said today. “Local production of flour in a previously dormant mill is a small but meaningful step in Baqubah that demonstrates that as al Qaeda in Iraq is driven out, economic growth emerges,” Navy Rear Adm. Mark I. Fox, deputy spokesman for Multinational Force Iraq, said at a news conference. The flour mill in Baqubah, closed for nearly a year,...

BAQOUBA, Iraq, Aug. 23, 2007 — The Baqouba public flour mill began processing wheat Aug. 20, after being closed for nearly a year, marking the local production of flour in the Diyala Province as a major step toward Iraqi self-sufficiency. "This is one more piece to the larger puzzle of providing normalcy here. It's probably the most important thing we've done." Lt. Col. Fred Johnson, deputy commanding officer of the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. "This is one more piece to the larger puzzle of providing normalcy here," said Lt. Col. Fred Johnson, deputy commanding officer of...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 15, 2007 – Recent surge operations and a continued commitment to ownership by the Iraqi government are contributing to increased economic progress in Iraq, a senior officer responsible for economic development there said yesterday. During a conference call with online journalists and “bloggers,” Army Col. Tracy O. Smith, chief of the Economic Development Branch of Multinational Force Iraq, provided an operational update on economic progress being made in Iraq’s provinces. He explained that the recent surge of forces and operations has improved the ability of coalition forces to conduct non-traditional military operations in a number of areas simultaneously,...

BAGHDAD, Aug. 14, 2007 – Fagah Al Dhahab needs money -- about $4 million, to hear him tell it. Dhahab is the director general of the Hillah textiles company. His cluster of factories in the capital of Iraq’s Babil province represents one piece of a network of state-run industries that dotted Iraq under Saddam Hussein, providing jobs and consumer goods, but also impeding competitive growth as lynchpins of Iraq’s controlled economy. Dhahab’s operations are ongoing but suffering, victims of inadequate funding, supply shortages, understaffing and a paucity of electricity. In July, the factory’s output was 450,000 meters of fabric. Before...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 13, 2007 – Santa might be visiting Iraq this year to fill his holiday wish, as Iraq’s once-sagging textile industry gears up to export Iraqi-made clothing to the United States, a senior Iraqi government official said yesterday in Baghdad. Deputy Industry Minister Sami al-Araji joined Paul Brinkley, deputy undersecretary of defense for business transformation, and Iraqi Minister of Finance Bayan Jabr at a joint news conference to discuss plans to get Iraq’s factories up and running. Many of the 200-plus state-run factories have been idle more than four years, resulting in mass unemployment that officials say creates a...

Iran to offer $1b credit line for Iraq’s economic projects TEHRAN, Aug. 23 (MNA) – Iran intends to establish a $1b credit line in Iraq to encourage investment and participation in the country’s major economic projects. The conditions on how to use the funds are yet to be elaborated and specified, general manager of International Relations Office at Iran’s Ministry of Industries and Mines announced on Wednesday. “Aziz Jaffar Hassan, financial advisor to Iraq’s vice-president, was in Tehran this week to discuss the terms and conditions of such an agreement with Mohsen Shaterzadeh, the ministry’s economic deputy. Both sides endorsed...

Rome, 20 Jan. (AKI) - Italian and Iraqi officials will on Sunday inaugurate a new business centre in the southern Iraqi city of Nasirya where Italy's military contingent in Iraq is currently deployed. The Bab Tahir International District includes an "industrial hotel' which aims to provide a venue where Italian and Iraqi business people can display their products and discuss investment and trade opportunities. Sunday's inauguration will be held under the auspices of the Italian Foreign Ministry which has organised the visit by a delegation of industrialists from Italy to coincide with the centre's opening. The event will also mark...

It appears the Iraqi stock market (ISX), is down approximately 25% in 2005, as most would expect-- considering its investors have to endure daily acts of terrorism. However, rough estimates indicate the Iraqi market had doubled in the first half of 2004, sold off, and then finished up 30% for the year. So, this years loss merely cancelled out last years gain. As one would imagine, it is very difficult to retrieve, live, accurate data, regarding the Iraqi exchange. However, despite all the violence and growing pains the exchange faces, the dedicated Iraqi brokers manage to keep the exchange running...

Despite bombs, Baghdad stock exchange thinks big 22 Nov 2005 12:25:03 GMT Source: Reuters By Deepa Babington BAGHDAD, Nov 22 (Reuters) - Bomb blasts around Baghdad routinely shake the trading room and it takes 10 days for an investor to receive proof of a stock order, but Iraq's fledgling stock exchange is thinking big. Operating out of a heavily protected building in a residential sidestreet, the Iraqi Stock Exchange's 50 brokers write up their prices on white boards but there are plans to introduce electronic trading by next summer. Despite the technological challenge of running a virtual exchange in...

WASHINGTON -- Three in four Iraqi business leaders are optimistic about the future though nearly half say they enjoyed better basic services under Saddam Hussein, according to a recent poll released by Zogby International and the Center for International Private Enterprise. "The respondents believe that their own firms will grow and succeed and that Iraq's economy and political system will continue to grow and develop," said the poll, which was released Wednesday. Seventy-seven percent of business leaders polled said they expected the economy as a whole to grow at least somewhat, with more than half of those predicting the growth...

AL ASAD, Iraq (Aug. 23, 2005) -- As if managing the Marine Aircraft Group 26 commanding officer’s budget wasn’t demanding enough, the Marines in the group’s fiscal office have been helping the local economy get back on its feet. While the group is deployed, the fiscal Marines have taken the role of purchasing agents to help the Marine Corps save money. For the last six months they have been accomplishing this and making a difference in the lives of Iraqi families who have businesses here. After being introduced to the local vendors, the MAG-26 Marines started working with them to...

CAMP BLUE DIAMOND, AR RAMADI, Iraq (August 18, 2005) -- The Ramadi Glass Works Factory, which was once the second largest employer in western Iraq’s Al Anbar Province, is slowly coming back to life. The factory’s management is working with coalition forces to gradually reopen the plant, which was closed last November after insurgents used the factory to stage attacks. Due to its key role in the local economy, both groups have pushed to open the facility, which also includes a ceramics factory. “It employs 2,300 people and the way we look at it those are 2,300 families affected,” said...

A proposal by Iraq's finance minister to reduce the enormous fuel and food subsidies that consume roughly a third of the government's budget and largely crush economic growth has been rejected by the cabinet after a recent similar move in Yemen set off fatal riots there. The subsidies, which artificially produce some of the lowest gasoline and heating fuel prices in the world and finance free basic foodstuffs, have been singled out by financial institutions both inside and outside Iraq as a crippling burden when the country is trying to create a free-market economy as it grapples with insurgent violence...

The tenacious insurgency in Iraq that continues to claim the lives of American soldiers could be defused through jobs and undermined if Islamic clerics took a strong stand against violence, the first U.S. administrator for the country said Thursday. Retired Army Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, who served six months in 2003 as director of the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance for postwar Iraq, offered those thoughts as part of a hopeful assessment of the country during a visit to this ski-resort town as part of a public-policy seminar. "Would we have done things differently? Absolutely. But we are where...

Before the war in Iraq began, many policymakers and oil industry experts believed that Iraq's oil industry, with the second-largest proven reserves of light crude in the world, would recover and provide most of the funds needed for Iraq's reconstruction. On March 27, 2003, for example, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said that Iraq's oil revenues could bring between US$50 and $100 billion within two or three years following the country's liberation. "We're dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon," he said.[1] Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmad Chalabi promised that American oil...

Although a small project for the Al Rasheed district, the opening of the Jihad Sewing School was a big step forward in improving the local economy. BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 13, 2005 — One mission that has remained constant for the U.S. soldiers of 3rd Battalion, 7th Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division since arriving in Iraq is helping to rebuild the civilian infrastructure. This is done in many ways, but the intent is to have Iraqis rebuild Iraq. "The school is small but they are training about 15 to 20 women and when they finish, they will...

Renovations are set to begin on the headquarters of an agricultural organization in northern Iraq, Portal Iraq reported. The improved facilities will enable the organization to provide better services to local farmers. The organization already provides many benefits to farmers through training programs. Currently, farmers receive instruction in the use of hybrid seeds, insecticides, improved livestock rearing, and computer and internet skills. Additionally, the organization offers training for non-traditional farmers and breeders who work with ostriches, mushrooms, grapefruit, or other produce and livestock. The training programs are part of the organization's mission to increase agricultural development by connecting farmers with...

BAGHDAD: If Iraqis have one solid economic achievement to hold on to amid their many problems, it is the strength of their currency, which some feared would be devalued out of existence in the months that followed the fall of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in March 2003. The dinar's current value of 1,465 to the benchmark U.S. dollar is virtually unchanged from January 2004, when the introduction of new banknotes to replace the Saddam-era denominations was completed. Sadoon Hamoud Kathir, professor of economics and administration at the University of Baghdad, attributes this remarkable level of stability to sound government...

Shoppers in Baghdad no longer need to carry plastic bags full of cash, as they did after years of international sanctions reduced the value of a 10,000-dinar note to less than $5 A year-and-a-half ago, the Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) began issuing higher-value currency notes. And it is now trying to help stimulate business around the country by reintroducing coins. But finance officials eager to move Iraq away from a heavily cash-based society have set their sights on a more ambitious goal: developing banking networks that will allow a shift to an electronic, largely credit-based economy. Doing away with...

BAGHDAD -- Iraqi leaders and business experts are scraping for ways to kick-start a war-torn economy, but plans to lure foreign investors keep getting hijacked by insurgent outlaws and old-style corruption. Housing and construction minister Jaseem Mohammed Jaafar said that inviting foreign businessmen into the country would be the best way to get up to 3 million housing units built. "Iraq is looking for about 3 million additional housing units to fill the gap between what is needed and what can be done" by domestic contractors, he told reporters on Tuesday. "The best way and the fastest way to do...

The upsurge in violence has worsened conditions for almost everyone and everything in Iraq, but the new currency. The Iraqi dinar is the winner as it has so far weathered the impact of mounting violence and car bombs that would have sent any other country’s currency tumbling. Since its launch in October, 2003, the new dinar has preserved its value vis-à-vis the U.S. dollar and other major countries. It is probably the only symbol of stability in a car torn by wars, civil strife and violence. However, Iraqi economists are not surprised to see the currency fending off the political...

BAGHDAD: In a country where cash is king, the arrival of Iraq's first credit card has been greeted with a mixture of enthusiasm and skepticism. The Trade Bank of Iraq launched the Visa card at a ceremony on May 9, as part of its plan to lift the economy and revive the banking system, which collapsed after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Ten cash machines have also been set up in Baghdad. The bank has so far issued its card to just 150 people, carefully chosen because they have both a bank account and a good credit rating. However, Hussein...

Milan (AsiaNews) – Iraq’s economy is recovering, especially in the more secure areas of the country, areas in which reconstruction has also begun. But things have “improved slightly” all over the “new”, post-election Iraq, as was explained to AsiaNews by Monsignor Louis Sako, Catholic Chaldean-rite Archbishop of Kirkuk, where the country’s oldest, and still richest, oil fields are located. The situation is improving also for Christians, who are generally better prepared and more resourceful than their Muslim compatriots, and who “as a group” are not suffering persecution, Archbishop Sako says, even if they are sometimes associated, on faith grounds, with...

BAGHDAD, Dec. 15 (Xinhuanet) -- The Iraqi Central Bank has succeeded in maintaining the exchange rates of the Iraqi dinar against the US dollar and other foreign currencies, despite a huge demand for the dollar by the market, the Al Mashriq newspaper reported Wednesday. "The bank sold yesterday 25.6 million dollars with 1,460 dinars against one dollar," said sources of the bank, adding that the money was sold through public auction and 14 banks participated in the transaction. Sinan Al Shibibi, governor of the Central Bank, was quoted as saying that lowering debts, according to an agreement of the Paris...

Basrah International Airport to Open in JulyAirport considered as first step to return Iraqi tourism December 16, 2004 By BJ Weiner U.S. Army Corps of Engineer Gulf Region District South The airport that never was, at least, not officially. Rumors have it that, in the past 10 years,   Basrah International Airport opened only when VIPs were visiting the country, and people worked at the airport only on those occasions. But, in July 2005, Basrah International Airport will officially open for commercial air and passenger traffic.            “The airport was never really functional,â€� said Nolan Smith, assistant area engineer for the...