Iraqis would be forced to pay for U.S. efforts in their country directly or via loans from the United States if any of at least five similar pieces of legislation introduced on Capitol Hill this month is approved.
This comes as Americans deal with — and politicians respond to — an unpopular and expensive war, a sinking economy and record gas prices, Ben Lando reports for United Press International.
“Whether or not you support the war strategy,” said Rep. Ron Klein, D-Fla., “the Iraqi government needs to pay for its fair share after five years and $600 billion in American taxpayer expenses.”
Klein’s resolution would require U.S. funds for Iraq reconstruction and security forces training, as well as the cost of fuel for U.S. operations, to be repaid by Iraq as a loan.
“What this resolution does is put the burden on the Iraqi people to say, ‘no more free lunches from the American public,’” Klein said. “It’s not some benefactor from the outside who just keeps writing more and more checks every month.” …
“This is just our notice to these guys we’re not going to carry the whole load anymore,” said Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif. He’s proposed in the past requiring Iraq to repay all U.S. expenses since the invasion. “Morally I think they should, but that’s a whole other debate.” …
The U.S. auditor of Iraq reconstruction efforts said in a January report more Iraqi funds have been allocated for reconstruction than U.S. funds through 2007. While the United States was initially tasked with spending the Iraqi money — a reconstruction effort criticized for being ill-planned and seeing few results — responsibility shifted to the new Iraqi government, which has had a harder time, regularly spending only a small percentage of its multibillion-dollar capital budget. …
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The Revival of Arbil, by Maad Fayad in Asharq Alawsat. The population of Arbil and the rest of the Kurds who live in Iraqi Kurdistan prefer to use the historical name ‘Lir’ in reference to the Kurdish region’s capital, Arbil, as an homage to the history of the region, which predates back to over 6,000 years. This history bears testimony to the fact that the Kurds, as a nation, settled in northern Mesopotamia thousands of years ago and that they are not foreigners to this region.
Graffiti inside this city’s ancient hilltop citadel quickly spells out the tension between Kirkuk’s three main ethnic groups – Kurds, Arabs, and Turkomen, Sam Dagher reports for The Christian Science Monitor. On one wall, an eagle descends on a two-headed serpent meant to symbolize enemies of the Kurdish nation. Next to it, the word “Arab” is erased and replaced with an etched “Kurdish” in a slogan that once read: “Kirkuk is an Arab city.” Another slogan reads: “Kirkuk is Turkmen.”
Kirkuk has been the object of a bitter struggle over the past five years among Iraq’s competing ethnic and sectarian groups. And now Arab, Kurd, and Turkmen factions seem to be digging in, anticipating that tensions may erupt in an area that is the center of northern Iraq’s oil industry ahead of a promised referendum on the fate of Kirkuk Province, officially still called Tamim, its previous Baath Party-era name.
The Iraqi government is about to make a major mistake: excluding Shi’ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr from the political process, Mohamad Bazzi writes for The Washington Times. (Bazzi covered Iraq as Newsday’s Middle East bureau chief and is the Edward R. Murrow Press Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.) On April 13, the Iraqi government approved a draft law barring any political party with a militia from participating in provincial elections set for October. While Sheik al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army were not specifically mentioned in the legislation, they are the intended target. Other Iraqi parties operate militias, but they have been largely absorbed into the Iraqi army or security forces. The bill is now before the Iraqi parliament.
It was the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine here that pushed Iraq to the brink of civil war, bloodshed that has left tens of thousands dead and this ancient city in ruins, Bradley Brooks reports for The Associated Press. But reconstruction of the famed mosque amid the rubble filling this city is under way, once bitter Shiite and Sunni enemies jointly man checkpoints and locals hope tourists will return again to see the shrine and help save the economy.
A record 63 percent of U.S. citizens think it was a mistake sending troops to fight in Iraq, the latest USA Today/Gallup Poll said Thursday, UPI reports.
The Iraq Press Roundup by UPI’s Hiba Dawood.
Top officials of the Veterans Affairs and Defense departments faced harsh questioning from the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee on Wednesday about recently leaked e-mails written by the VA’s head of mental health revealing that nearly 1,000 U.S. soldiers per month have attempted suicide after returning from service in Iraq and Afghanistan, Rafael Enrique Valero reports for Government Executive.
Lt. Col. Billy Hall, one of the most senior officers to be killed in the Iraq war, was laid to rest yesterday at Arlington National Cemetery. It’s hard to escape the conclusion that the Pentagon doesn’t want you to know that, Dana Milbank writes for The Washington Post. The family of 38-year-old Hall, who leaves behind two young daughters and two stepsons, gave their permission for the media to cover his Arlington burial — a decision many grieving families make so that the nation will learn about their loved ones’ sacrifice. But the military had other ideas, and they arranged the Marine’s burial yesterday so that no sound, and few images, would make it into the public domain.
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee wants information from defense contractors such as KBR and Blackwater Worldwide on their use of off-shore subsidiaries to avoid taxes, Dan Friedman reports for Government Executive.
A group of U.S. senators on Thursday will call on the Bush administration to use its leverage with OPEC to increase oil supplies or risk Congress holding up multimillion dollar arms deals with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other members of the oil producing group, of which Iraq was a founding member, Reuters reports.
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