These are the archives for the week ending 6th January 2006
US plans Afghan jail for terror suspects
The US government has plans to build a high-security prison in Afghanistan to hold terror suspects, including some who would be transferred from the controversial US naval base at Guantánamo Bay.
The site selected for the jail is Pol-e-Charki, a rundown prison near Kabul dating from the Soviet era. Some of the base's prison facilities have recently been refurbished as part of a European Union-financed criminal justice reform programme backed by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
The transfer of prisoners of Afghan origin from Guantánamo to Afghanistan is intended to take pressure off the US administration, which continues to face strong international criticism for holding detainees without trial or other legal recourse.
Financial Times 5/1/06
Fears of Afghan link to Iraqi insurgency
Suspected Taliban militants have beheaded a headteacher in central Afghanistan, the latest in a string of gruesome attacks on teachers working in schools where girls are taught.
The Taliban insurgency has taken a brutal twist in the past year with militants avoiding shoot-outs with American troops - which they usually lose - in favour of targeted assassinations of teachers, aid workers and pro-government clerics.
The violent tactics, which are concentrated in the southern provinces where a British-led Nato force is due to assume control next spring, appear to be working. Nabi Khushal, the director of education in Zabul, told the Associated Press that 100 of the province's 170 registered schools had been closed over the past two years, mostly in remote areas, due to deteriorating security. Only 8% of the pupils are girls, he said.
The tactical shift, combined with a sharp rise in suicide attacks and roadside bombs, has stoked fears of a link with the Iraqi insurgency.
Guardian 5/1/06
Another bloody week
Two suicide bombers killed 120 people and wounded more than 200 in attacks near a Shi'ite holy shrine and a police recruiting center on Thursday, the bloodiest day in Iraq for four months. Seven U.S. soldiers were killed in two roadside bomb attacks, three bombs exploded in Baghdad and insurgents sabotaged an oil pipeline near the northern city of Kirkuk, causing a huge fire.
In all, violence has killed more than 240 people and wounded more than 280 in the five days since the New Year started, a death toll comparable with some of the nation's bloodiest weeks since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.
Thursday's U.S. death toll was the highest for a single day since last month's parliamentary elections, which have yet to produce a government. Final results from the vote are expected soon but it could be months before a new parliament is formed.
Reuters, 5/1/06
Unemployed clash with police
Clashes have broken out in Nasiriya in southern Iraq between Iraqis demanding employment and police. Several hundred protesters gathered on Wednesday in front of the Nasiriya governorate headquarters, demanding that job promises previously made to them by local authorities be kept. The rallyists said the authorities had been pledging to provide decent job opportunities since the past two years, but to date nothing had materialised.
Police used force to disperse the crowds, triggering a violent response. Protesters burned several cars and exchanged fire with policemen.
Aljazeera, 4/1/06
UK drops Iran charge
Britain has dropped its allegation that Iran has been supplying extremist groups in southern Iraq with bombs. After a thorough assessment of the latest intelligence, military and diplomatic officials have stopped pointing the finger at Tehran, merely saying that the new technology matched bomb-making expertise traditionally found in Syria and Lebanon.
Times, 2/1/06
US digging in for a long stay
As President Bush announced an end to the U.S.'s funding to "rebuild" Iraq, contracts were being made to build a $1 billion U.S. Embassy complex in Baghdad's heavily-fortified Green Zone, which houses Iraqi government offices, the U.S. military command and some Western embassies.
The fortified complex will be the U.S.'s biggest and most secure building overseas. The complex will also include bunkers for use during U.S. air strikes, and about 300 houses for consular and military officials.
A Kuwait-based construction firm has already been awarded $300 million of the embassy deal. Several other Middle Eastern and American building companies are bidding for the remaining budget.
The building is in effect an imperial seat of power, which will be built in Iraq alongside four massive military superbases the U.S. is building around the Iraqi capital. Washington has many "secret' military bases in several Gulf states, including Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar. The huge desert bases, that include airstrips and aircraft hangars, are up to 20 miles square and are not shown on civilian maps. The world began to know about them after the first Gulf War 15 years ago.
The secret plans reinforce views that Washington wants to keep a firm foothold in Iraq for many years.
Al Jazeera 4/1/06
Iraq's deadliest day since poll
A string of attacks across Iraq has made it the deadliest day in the country since the 15 December election.
In the worst attack, at least 36 people were killed in a suicide bombing at a Shia funeral north of Baghdad. Across Iraq, more than 50 people died.
In Washington, President George Bush said the plan in Iraq was going well. He said Iraqi forces were improving all the time. "As Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down," he said, touting possible further cuts in US troop levels.
Mr Bush said wide participation in Iraq's election showed the people were buying into the new democracy, and had more confidence in their security. "The election results served as a real defeat for the rejectionists," he said.
However, after a drop in insurgent attacks around the time of the elections, car bombings and suicide attacks have intensified.
BBC News 4/1/06
Bush can break terror law
When President Bush last week signed the bill outlawing the torture of detainees, he quietly reserved the right to bypass the law under his powers as commander in chief. fter approving the bill last Friday, Bush issued a ''signing statement" -- an official document in which a president lays out his interpretation of a new law -- declaring that he will view the interrogation limits in the context of his broader powers to protect national security. This means Bush believes he can waive the restrictions, the White House and legal specialists said.
Boston Globe, 4/1/06
Bush losing support in military
Support for President George W. Bush's Iraq policy has fallen among the US armed forces to just 54 percent from 63 percent a year ago, according to a poll by the magazine group Military Times. With 61 percent of respondents saying they had served in Iraq or Afghanistan, only 58 percent believed that Bush had the military's best interests at heart, a sharp decline from 69 percent a year before.
Only 56 percent felt the US should have gone to war in Iraq, compared to 60 percent a year before.
Yahoo News, 2/1/06
US air raid kills seven
A U.S. air strike killed several members of a family in the oil refining town of Baiji in northern Iraq, Iraqi security forces said on Tuesday. The U.S. military, responding to an inquiry, said aircraft had targeted a house after three men suspected of planting a roadside bomb were seen entering the building late on Monday. Local people at the scene of the blast said seven bodies were recovered from the rubble, including at least two children.
Reuters, 3/1/06
US ends reconstruction of Iraq
The Bush administration has scaled back its ambitions to rebuild Iraq from the devastation wrought by war and dictatorship and does not intend to seek new funds for reconstruction, it emerged yesterday. In a decision that will be seen as a retreat from a promise by President George Bush to give Iraq the best infrastructure in the region, administration officials say they will not seek reconstruction funds when the budget request is presented to Congress next month.
A decision not to renew the reconstruction programme would leave Iraq with the burden of tens of billions of dollars in unfinished projects, and an oil industry and electrical grid that have yet to return to pre-war production levels. The decision is a tacit admission of the failure of the US rebuilding effort in the face of a relentless insurgency. Nearly half the funds earmarked for reconstruction were diverted towards fighting the insurgency and preparations to put Saddam Hussein on trial.
Guardian, 3/1/06
US increases air strikes
American forces are dramatically stepping up air attacks on insurgents in Iraq as they prepare to start the withdrawal of ground troops in the spring. The number of airstrikes in 2005, running at a monthly average of 25 until August, surged to 120 in November and an expected 150 in December, according to official military figures. The tempo looks set to increase this year as the Americans pull back from urban combat, leaving street fighting increasingly to Iraqi forces supported by US air power.
In an example of the strategy, two US F16 fighters last week dropped two 500lb laser-guided bombs on three men planting roadside explosives in Kirkuk province, killing them and seven others.
However, some experts insist that bombs cannot replace boots on the ground. "It's transitory. You hit it, even occupy it, but then the insurgents return when you've gone, like Falluja last year," said Wing Commander Andrew Brookes of the International Insititute for Strategic Studies. "Even a 400lb bomb has a wide area of blast and you are quite likely to kill some civilians. Kill a wife, children, mother or uncle and people become so angry the terrorist cycle starts all over again."
Sunday Times, 1/1/06
Oil production at new low
Iraq's oil exports in December fell to their lowest level since the official end of the conflict in 2003, Iraqi interim government figures have shown. Last month's exports totalled 1.1 million barrels per day, down from November's 1.2 million figure.
Shamkhi Faraj, the government's director general of economics and oil marketing, blamed the fall on the security situation.
BBC News, 2/1/06
Two fuel protesters killed
At least two people have been killed as security forces in Iraq opened fire during a protest against fuel shortages in the city of Kirkuk. The demonstration is the latest in a wave of country-wide fuel protests. The demonstration in Kirkuk was joined by hundreds of people. Men marched along the main street protesting against a lack of basic services and the government's decision to raise petrol prices threefold 13 days ago. An overnight curfew was imposed. A police spokesman said demonstrators had set cars and petrol stations alight and attacked police.
The demonstration comes as Iraq grapples with a fuel crisis stemming from the closure of a major refinery in the north that has prompted panic buying of fuel and long queues at petrol stations. The protest was the latest in a series of country-wide demonstrations against fuel shortages. The refinery, in the northern town of Baiji, was closed 10 days ago following death threats to tanker drivers.
BBC News, 1/1/06