http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/02/201221616142140730.html
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| Iraqi panel lays out charges against Hashemi |
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Sunni VP accused by investigating judges of running death squads that targeted security officials and Shia pilgrims. Last Modified: 16 Feb 2012 17:21 |
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| Hashemi has denied the allegation that he ordered attacks on Shia Muslim pilgrims, calling it a smear campaign [EPA] |
An Iraqi judicial panel says that Tariq al-Hashemi, the country's Sunni vice-president, and his employees ran death squads that for years carried out deadly attacks on security officials and Shia Muslim pilgrims.
The nine-judge committee's findings, which are not legally binding, offered on Thursday the first independent assessment of a case that has touched off a political crisis along sectarian lines and brought the Iraqi government's work practically to a halt.
Hashemi has denied the allegations, and accuses Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, of co-ordinating a smear campaign as part of a power grab.
Abdul-Sattar Bayrkdar, a spokesman for the Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council, said the investigating panel found at least 150 cases where either Hashemi, his bodyguards or other employees were linked to attacks ranging from roadside bombs to assassinations against security officials and Shia pilgrims.
Bayrkdar, who did not offer any evidence to back up the panel's conclusions, said the death squads operated from 2005 to 2011.
He said they were behind a bombing last December on the government's Integrity Commission headquarters that killed 25 people and the assassination of a deputy education minister in 2010.
No immediate comment
There was no immediate comment from Hashemi or his Sunni-backed Iraqiya party.
The investigation was ordered by Madhat al-Mahmoud, Chief Judge of the Supreme Judicial Council, after Maliki's Shia-dominated government issued a warrant in December for Hashemi's arrest.
The investigating committee was created by the Supreme Judicial Council specifically to examine the charges against Hashemi.
"We are an independent body that is not linked to any executive body," Saad al-Lami, one of the nine judges, said after the findings were announced.
He said Maliki's office has "nothing to do with these investigations".
Hashemi was one of hundreds of Sunnis who were charged with crimes in what Sunnis called an attempt Maliki and his supporters to target political enemies.
He is currently in Iraq's northern Kurdish region, where he has sought refuge.
In December, he accused Maliki of ordering the warrant on "fabricated" charges as a campaign to "embarrass" him.
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http://www.iraqdirectory.com/DisplayNews.aspx?id=18395
Iraq blocks Exxon from next round of licensing |
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| The National - [2/14/2012] |
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ExxonMobil, the world's largest oil and gas company, has been excluded from the coming licensing round in Iraq and could lose existing concessions, after it signed oil deals with the Kurdistan Regional Government late last year.
Baghdad plans to auction off 12 exploration blocks next month. Angered by Exxon's refusal to be deterred by a blacklisting policy that bars companies active in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region from participating in licensing rounds in southern Iraq, the government has banned the US super major from its fourth licensing round.
"The Iraqi government has decided that Exxon won't be allowed to participate in the next oil and gas bidding round," a spokesman for Hussain Al Shahristani, Iraq's deputy prime minister for energy, told the Dow Jones news service yesterday.
The government is waiting for a reply to letters warning Exxon that it risks losing its existing contracts in southern Iraq, according to the spokesman, who said that the company's response could decide the outcome.
"We are still waiting for Exxon to answer our letters in which we warned that it has to choose between contracts in Kurdistan and those in southern Iraq," the spokesman said.The US oil company has a stake in the West Qurna 1 field - the country's second largest - near Basra, where it is producing alongside Royal Dutch Shell, Lukoil and Statoil.
Baghdad does not recognise contracts signed by the Kurdistan Regional Government and fears that giving the Kurds autonomy over the region's energy policy will encourage separatism.
Analysts say the willingness of international oil companies to risk southern concessions is due to the technical service contracts under which they operate. These do not reward the companyies for the risk arising from excessive bureaucracy, contract delays and security concerns.
"The risks need to be factored and costed rightly. Investors of billions of dollars are reluctant to continue to under those conditions," said Luay Al Khatteeb, the executive director of the Iraq Energy Institute. |
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