Results for "ba umbling"

Mohaned Ahmed is standing on scaffolding at the ancient site of Babylon, dipping water into a bucket and sponging the bricks around a stone relief showing a dragon with a serpent's head. The image is so well defined it looks as if it might have been made yesterday instead of more than 2,000 years ago. […]

The statue of the Lion of Babylon stands in the ancient city of Babylon, south of Baghdad, founded in 1880 B.C. The statue was uncovered in 1876 by a German archaeological mission. Some initially suggested that the statue, more than 4,000 years old, was built by the Chaldean King Nebuchadnezzar II (605-562 B.C.), though others now believe it was […]

On Jan. 21, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met with Iraq's prime minister in Davos, Switzerland, and handed him a personal note from President Barack Obama pleading for urgent action. Obama's confidential message to Haider al-Abadi, which was confirmed to Reuters by two U.S. officials and has not been previously reported, was not about […]

When Iraqi merchant Jabar Mohamed was growing up in the southern port city of Basra, he liked to watch boats gliding along a canal lined with palm trees and ancient buildings near his home. Once dubbed the “Venice of the Middle East” for its network of canals resembling the Italian city, Basra was a magnet […]

ast the Army checkpoints, the razor wire, sandbags, blast walls, machine-gun towers, camouflage netting and war-smashed buildings, the sleek white Hummer 2 stretch limo rolled through Baghdad like a little slice of Vegas. On the crumbling sidewalks, women draped in ghostly black abaya robes waved at the limo. Children ran alongside squealing. Startled old men […]

Outside the crumbling elementary school, goats feed on trash strewn across the front yard. Inside, the ceiling is rotting, toilets don't work and students scrunch hip-to-hip behind narrow desks. Millions of dollars in international aid to build and repair Iraq's dilapidated schools have for years gone unspent. Now, Iraq's government risks losing the funding as […]

The issue of legal immunity for foreign troops in Iraq, which already torpedoed plans to keep a U.S. military presence in the country, has emerged as a key stumbling block in talks over the extension of a NATO training mission here. In July, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki requested that the alliance extend the NATO […]

Flooding across Iraq that has left at least 13 people dead and caused widespread structural damage has also provided rich fodder for sarcastic Iraqis bemoaning their decrepit public services. The floodwaters, which have cut off entire areas of Baghdad and several other cities to most vehicles, were caused by several days of heavy rainfall that […]