Plus:
*Japan, Turkey team up for Iraq oil and gas bid
*CNPC starts Ahdab work
*Oil price drop sparks budget changes
*Oil smugglers arrested
*new video–Alive in Baghdad: Two Families Survive Iraq’s Militias
*Basra port privatization begins
*The Iraq Press Roundup
*And much more

A lawmaker from the parliament’s commission of power on Tuesday said he would collect signatures from MPs to accelerate presenting oil and gas law in the Council of Representatives, Voices of Iraq reports.

Mitsubishi Corp. and Japan Petroleum Exploration Co. will discuss with Turkey’s state-controlled company next week on joint exploration and production in Iraq, the holder of the world’s third-largest oil reserves, Bloomberg reports.

A Chinese oil delegation on Sunday arrived in Wassit province ahead of preparations for development work on al-Ahdab oilfield, VOI reports.

Oil giants find scramble for Iraq is a game with complex rules, The Observer’s Tim Webb reports. Western firms eyeing lucrative deals fear legal difficulties.

Iraqi finance officials, taken by surprise by the sudden drop in crude prices, are drawing up contingency spending plans to trim next year’s budget by an estimated 19%, Gina Chon reports for the Wall Street Journal. The country is dependent on oil sales for some 90% of government revenue. Politicians here have been under intense pressure to show signs of economic improvement amid a generally brighter security situation. Government spending is key to that effort — to improve basic services such as electricity and water; to carry out big reconstruction projects; and to create jobs.

Policemen arrested four oil smugglers, including a man wanted by security authorities, northwest of Kirkuk on Monday, a senior security official said, VOI reports.

An authorized source from the Iraqi Ministry of Industry on Monday said that Al-Iz General Company produced a domestic solar energy unit, VOI reports.

The official spokesperson of the Iraqi Ministry of Electricity on Monday said that Kareem Waheed, the electricity minister, met the Chinese ambassador in Baghdad, and demanded that he contact the Chinese company responsible for executing Zubaidiya power station in Wassit, to commence the project, VOI reports.

Alive in Baghdad: Two Families Survive Iraq’s Militias

The sectarian conflict in Iraq was one of the main problems that has continued to limit stability and security in certain Iraqi provinces. Many people were forced to sell their house and flee to other neighborhoods or to leave Iraq entirely. In other cases they were not able to sell any of their property such as cars or furniture, and had to flee immediately.

Iraq has completed a study for a port at Umm Qasr in the southern Basra province, Hugh Tomlinson reports for MEED. Engineers from the State Company for Iraqi Ports have designed a new project to fit between Umm Qasr’s existing north and southern ports. The government is likely to pursue similar short-term lease agreements at other berths to ease concerns in Basra that the privatisation will mean relinquishing control of a national asset. However, the ministry is still close to appointing an international consultant to oversee planning for the privatisation.

US referees Iraq’s troubled Kurdish-Arab fault line, Scott Peterson reports for The Christian Science Monitor. At a flash point for violence, an Army general plays diplomat. Few issues will affect Iraq’s future more than the final relationship between the Kurds – whose autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq has its own president, ministers, militia, and flag – and the Shiite-run central government in Baghdad.

The reports keep getting more persistent: Nuri al-Maliki is apparently building ties to southern tribes at the expense of – and sometimes to loud protests from – ISCI and Badr, Reidar Visser writes on historiae.org. The latest case to receive some attention in the Iraqi press is Nasiriyya and Dhi Qar.

Read what Iraqis read: the Iraq Press Roundup by
UPI’s Alaa Majeed.
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