Sadr City is one of the capital’s longstanding Shiite communities. Located in northeastern Baghdad, it was originally called Al Thawra, Revolution, and then Saddam City until the fall of the dictator in 2003. Then it was changed to Sadr City after Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr, Moqtada al-Sadr’s father. It is one of the poorest districts of Baghdad. After 2003 it became a base for Sadr and his Mahdi Army, and the scene of fierce fighting in 2008 between Iraqi and U.S. forces and militiamen. Today, every Friday men can be seen inside and outside mosques doing their prayers as most do in the rest of Iraq.
One man out of sync during Friday prayers amongst Sadrists, Sadr City, Baghdad, May 11, 2012 (AP)
More Sadrists during Friday prayers May 11, 2012 (AP)
Another group of men at prayer in Sadr City, May 4 (Getty Images)
A young boy and older men at Friday service May 4 (Getty Images)
Followers of Moqtada al-Sadr at Friday's prayers in Sadr City May 18 (Getty Images)
More from the May 18 prayers (Getty Images)
Two men trying to stay out of the heat in Sadr City on May 18, sitting up against a wall with portraits of Moqtada al-Sadr (right) and his father Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr (left) behind them (Getty Images)
SOURCES
Encyclopedia Britannica, “Baghdad”
Global Security, “Sadr City (Saddam City/Al Thawra) Baghdad, Iraq”
In 2009, Iraq held two rounds of auctions for international energy firms to bid on its oil fields. That resulted in the return of foreign companies to Iraq’s petroleum industry after a decade long drought, because of international sanctions. Afterward, Iraq announced that it would reach 12 million barrels a day in capacity by 2017. If that was accomplished it would be one of the greatest expansions in world history. Unfortunately for Iraq, no one believed that figure was possible. Now, Shell, one of the firms that successfully participated in the 2009 bidding, is in talks with the Oil Ministry to reconfigure its deal. It wants to reduce its production target, and extend its timeline by several years. If it accomplishes that, all the other oil companies working in Iraq are likely to want to renegotiate their terms as well.
Map of Majnoon and Iraq's major southern and central oil fields (BBC)
Shell is developing the Majnoon field in Basra, but is in talks with the Oil Ministry to change its contract. Shell originally won rights to the bloc in December 2009, putting in a winning bid with Malaysia’s Petronas. The two agreed to produce 1.8 million barrels a day by 2017. Currently, Majnoon is pumping 65,000 barrels a day. Shell wants to reduce its production target to 1 million barrels a day, and extend the date that’s to be reached by twenty years or more. The company would also like to reduce its investment in the field from the original amount of $50 billion to around $40 billion. Shell has already spent $1 billion on the field since 2010, and plans on investing another $1 billion this year. The corporation has already met with Iraqi officials once in March 2012, and is supposed to meet again in May in Lebanon. The Oil Ministry seems to be open to Shell’s proposals, but will not budge on the remuneration fee of $1.39 per barrel. The production goals and dates were based upon the bidding that took place in 2009. The oil companies worked out fees and numbers with the Oil Ministry until they got to a point where they thought they could make a profit. They were not based upon any sound analysis of the fields, the country’s infrastructure, Iraq’s needs or anything else substantive. That’s how Iraq came to claim it could reach 12 million barrels a day in capacity by 2017, even though no one believed that was possible. Deputy Premier Hussein Shahristani, who is in charge of Iraq’s energy policy, has already officially dropped that mark to 11 million barrels by 2020, but the Oil Ministry has talked about cutting that even more to 8-8.5 million barrels. Some analysts and oil company executives believe that a more realistic figure might be 6 million barrels a day. From the start, Shell knew it could not reach the numbers it set in its 2009 bid. It went ahead anyway, because it wanted to get into the Iraqi market along with all the other firms, because of its huge, untapped potential. Some believe that Iraq has enough petroleum reserves to maintain international prices in the future as demand increases, and other countries cut back on their production. There was no way that Shell was going to miss out on that. After it started work in Iraq, reality kicked in, and that has led it to enter into talks with Baghdad to change its deal.
Shell’s negotiations could lead to revising all of Iraq’s oil contracts. Companies have complained about the work environment in the country due to red tape holding up everything from visas to equipment shipped into the country. Some companies have gotten into payment disputes, and Iraq lacks adequate infrastructure, and what it has is aging. That causes bottlenecks, such as not having enough pipeline or storage capacity to deal with all the increased production that the foreign companies have achieved so far. Many of the fields along the border with Iran also need mine clearing due to unexploded ordinance from the Iran-Iraq War. If Shell is successful in their bargaining, it is likely that all the other companies that signed deals in 2009 will ask to change theirs as well. That will lead to more realistic figures for Iraq’s oil industry, and give the companies breathing room, because they were facing penalties if they did not reach their marks. Deputy Premier Shahristani has already talked about coming up with new numbers based upon conversations with energy executives, so Baghdad is open to these revisions. It’s just a matter of time then, before Shell is likely to emerge with a reconfigured contract, with others following suit.
The two bid rounds for Iraqi oil fields in 2009 were as much a development story, as a political one. Iraq wanted to announce that it was returning as a major player in international markets after years of wars, sanctions, and the U.S. invasion. Its claim that it could reach 12 million barrels in capacity was as much a political statement to that affect as anything else. No other country has ever been able to produce that much in such a short amount of time, so analysts were always skeptical, but the headlines still went around the world, which was what Baghdad wanted. Now after a few years of actual work in Iraq, companies are slowly going to the Oil Ministry asking for new terms. Shell is the first one to officially do so, and could set the standard for all the others. The results will be much more realistic numbers for how much oil Iraq is likely to produce in the future. That doesn’t mean Iraq will still not have large growth, and play a more important role in OPEC, it just won’t be as big as some originally claimed.
SOURCES
Dow Jones, “Iraq’s Majoon Oil Field To Hit 175,000 Barrels A Day In August –Official,” 2/7/12
Falush, Simon and Mackey, Peg, “Iraq to lower oil target to more prudent level,” Reuters, 4/18/12
Even though Iraq is supposed to be a democracy, it lacks many prerequisites of that political system. One is that it does not have due process, and torture and abuse of prisoners is common. That has been documented again in again by human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch. That group’s most recent report, “Iraq: Mass Arrests, Incommunicado Detentions” went over two major arrest campaigns carried out by the government at the end of 2011 against alleged Baathists, and another in March 2012 before the Arab League Summit in Baghdad. In both cases, the security forces rounded up hundreds of people with no warrants, and held them incommunicado, often in secret facilities. This all goes to show that while Iraq has the trappings of a democratic system, it is not quite there yet, because it still does not respect its citizens’ rights.
In March 2012, there was another crackdown just before the Arab League Summit in Baghdad. At the time, State of Law parliamentarians denied that any arrests were being made, but that was refuted by people picked up, members of the Interior Ministry, and the head of the security committee in parliament. The head of that committee said that he had reports from the Baghdad Operations Command detailing 532 arrests. Two other members of the committee claimed that figure was low. In May, members of the security and human rights committees formed a special committee to look into the matter, but nothing was ever heard about it again. A common experience when the government claims it will look into abuses of power. Human Rights Watch found that the government seemed to focus upon five neighborhoods in Baghdad province, Abu Ghraib, Adhamiya, Furat, Jihad, and Rathwaniya, and seemed to go after people that were held by the United States before. Twenty people arrested said that none of them ever saw any warrants. A Justice Ministry official claimed that by April, some of the people had been released, 100 would be charged, and the rest were being held somewhere secret. Human Rights Watch believed that this campaign was simply preventive to try to secure the Arab summit by rounding up people that had been arrested before.
An interrogation room at Camp Honor (Human Rights Watch)
During October and March, people were taken to Camp Honor and two other facilities in the Green Zone in Baghdad. Camp Honor was supposedly closed in March 2011 after a report came out that it was being used as a secret prison where abuse was happening. Several recent prisoners however, told Human Rights Watch that they were taken to the camp. All the detention centers were used for interrogations and confessions, before people were switched to official prisons. All three were under the control of the 56th Brigade, also known as the Baghdad Brigade. That Brigade has been known to carry out arrests at the behest of the premier. It reports directly to the prime minister, and is outside the regular chain of command for the armed forces. It appears that Maliki is also running his own series of jails as well.
Human Rights Watch also documented on-going abuses of the security forces. Two Justice Ministry officials said that the security forces have often held people without turning them over to the courts. They said that the army and police also would shift prisoners around to different prisons to keep them away from their families, lawyers, and the judiciary. They claimed this was all done under the authority of the prime minister. The security forces often carry out mass sweeps of areas, by cordoning them off, and going door to door with wanted lists, and regular arrest campaigns in Sunni areas of Baghdad and other provinces. Some prisoners are treated fairly, but others are abused and tortured. Most released detainees told Human Rights Watch that they were forced to sign a pledge not to criticize the government publicly or a confession. If they didn’t, the guards threatened them with torture or indefinite detention. Some families were asked to pay bribes to get their family members released. Lawyers added that it was almost impossible to see their clients, and would regularly get the run around at prisons or be threatened by officials for trying to represent alleged insurgents or Baathists. These are all common practices documented in other reports by human rights groups. They point to the failure of Iraq to follow its own laws, and implement due process.
At the heart of the matter is the failure of Iraq to reform its justice system and security forces after the fall of Saddam Hussein. The United States originally wanted to rebuild both from scratch, but never committed the necessary personnel or funds to do so. When the Iraqis regained their sovereignty in 2005, the political parties took control of the security and justice ministries, and placed personnel in office that had no experience in those fields, and often followed what they knew best, which was Saddam’s practices or the authoritarian regimes that they had lived in exile under such as Syria and Iran. That is why Iraq still arrests people without warrants, holds them incommunicado, hides prisoners, maintains secret prisons, abuses and tortures people, and gains false confessions to convict people with. It’s unlikely that this will ever change until someone at the top decides to tackle the issue. Such a politician does not appear on the horizon, so Iraqis will continue to have to live under this unjust system.
A dust storm recently descended upon Baghdad. Hospitals and clinics have been flooded with people complaining about breathing troubles. Iraq’s Meteorological Agency predicted that the dust would remain over Baghdad and many other cities for the remainder of the week. The situation was so bad that on May 22, Baghdad International Airport had to shut down all flights. Iraq often experiences these storms, and the situation may be getting worse, because the country has gone through a multi-year drought, and the water supply from Iraq’s rivers has decreased due to increased usage and damming by up river countries Syria, Iran, and Turkey. That increases desertification and dries out farmland, both of which creates more particles that can be picked up, and become a storm.
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SOURCES
Agence France Presse, “Dust storm shuts Iraq airport,” 5/22/12
Shwqi, Afrah, “Medical alert in Baghdad due to dust storms,” AK News, 5/22/12
Since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has been following its own independent oil policy. Part of that has included attracting foreign companies to invest in the disputed territories that stretch across Ninewa, Salahaddin, Tamim, and Diyala provinces. This is part of the Kurds’ larger plans to annex these areas. Several companies entered into such deals, but most of them were small to medium sized. At the end of 2011, Kurdistan pulled off a coup when it got Exxon Mobile to agree to terms for six blocks, three of which were in the disputed areas. What’s more, it’s not clear that all the corporations knew that they were going to work in those places, and the KRG has officially denied that it has signed any contracts for them. By inking deals there, the Kurds hope to create facts on the ground to help their claims to the land, and solidify their control over them.
Map of Exxon's deals and its blocs that are in disputed areas (Independent)
The Kurds have signed several oil deals with foreign companies in the disputed territories. On May 17, 2012, England’s Afren Oil announced that it found new oil deposits at the Ain Sifni field, part of which stretches into disputed areas of Ninewa. Back in October 2011, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) signed a deal with Exxon Mobil for six oil and gas blocks. Three of those fields, Bashika, Qara Hajjer, and Qush Tappa were outside of Kurdistan in Ninewa and Tamim provinces. The first such contract was with America’s Prime Natural Resources for the Shakal field, followed by the United Arab Emirate’s Dana Gas for the Khor Mor field, then Turkey’s Norbest for the Hawler field and America’s Hunt Oil for the Ain Sifni bloc in 2007. In 2009, Canada’s Shamaran Petroleum Corporation entered a deal for the Pukhana field, Australia’s Oil Search for Taza, and Canada’s Longford Energy for Chia Surkh. All of those companies were medium sized energy firms, but Exxon was a completely different matter. It is one of the largest oil corporations in the world. That marked a dramatic change in the Kurds’ strategy. The central government has called all of the KRG’s oil contracts illegal, because they did not go through the Oil Ministry. Baghdad could also ignore most of the them, because of the size of the companies. It could not do that with Exxon. It could force the regional and central governments to reconcile their energy policies, and confirm the Kurds’ hold over the disputed areas.
Map of the disputed territories of northern Iraq (UNAMI)
The Kurds have not always been up front about their intentions to work in the disputed areas. Not all the businesses were aware that they were signing for work in the disputed areas for example. Exxon might not have known exactly where three of the blocks they were going to develop were located. That’s because the KRG has tried to obscure where the areas are, and officially denies that they have oil operations there. The Kurds have also ordered all security and energy companies that work for them to remove any maps that show the Green Line, which is the border between Kurdistan and the disputed areas. The Kurdish Natural Resource Minister Ashti Hawrami has publicly said several times that there is no Green Line. In 2008, he said that as long as the Kurds controlled an area that was all that mattered. This ignored the work of the United Nations and the 2005 Iraqi constitution. In the 1990s, the U.N. mapped the Green Line based upon minefields and roads created by Saddam Hussein. The Transitional Administrative Law drawn up by the Coalition Provisional Authority and the 2005 Constitution both said that the Kurds could only control areas that they had under their authority before the 2003 invasion. After the fall of Saddam, the Kurds moved in their forces south of the Green Line, and have set up administrative and security control of them since then. Getting energy firms to enter the territories was just one more step at integrating them into Kurdistan. Minister Hawrami was just expressing the unofficial line of the KRG in his statements, which is that it already has de facto control of the areas, and can do what they want there.
The Kurdistan Regional Government has been signing deals for the disputed areas for years now, and they may finally be coming to fruition. Nothing much was said about them at first, because they were with rather small companies and only for exploration work. Now the Kurds have a contract with Exxon that could completely change the status quo. Baghdad has objected to all of the Kurdish deals, but is in a real bind with this latest one. It cannot ignore Exxon, because it is one of the biggest energy companies in the world, and already has a contract with the Oil Ministry for a field in Basra. That means no matter how much Baghdad complains about it, there is no reversing the deal. The Kurds have also finally realized their dreams of convincing a major oil corporation to work with them. Both of those facts could eventually get the two sides to compromise on their energy policies. Finally, the Kurds already have administrative and security authority over the disputed territories, and now their oil contracts mean that they are leading the economic development of the areas as well, solidifying their control over them. While the central government may never finally decide the fate of the contested areas of northern Iraq in the immediate future, they are for all intense and purposes operating as part of Kurdistan as these oil deals prove.
KRG Natural Resource Minister Ashti Hawrami’s Comments About The Green Line And Disputed Territories
“There is no hardl line drawn somewhere that says this is KRG controlled territory and these are disputed territories, it is all gray areas. We provide the security; administratively we run the towns and villages in that area. It is and has always been under control of KRG, under our security.” UPI, Nov. 2007
"You show me the green line in the constitution. You show me a green line that officially anybody signed on it. There are many green lines. But what counts really is what is currently under the KRG authority." UPI, Jun.2008
“Iraq Oil Report (IOR): Taking into consideration the development you have had, which will be part of the discussion to update the draft law, how do you deal with the contracts that are in disputed territories?
Hawrami: No, we don’t have anything in disputed territories.
IOR: There are blocks, such as the Hunt block…
Hawrami: It is not, it is within Kurdistan.
IOR: It’s not within disputed territories?
Hawrami: We are administering, we have elections, we have everything which is run from Kurdistan. What are you talking about? We have everything contracted by Kurdistan, within Kurdistan. Remember there is disputed territories; I’m not expert in that. There is no particular line. It comes down to who is in charge of it, now or then. It is bigger than where you draw a line. It needs to be fundamentally sorted out, so it’s a different article, different thing. It’s not my department. I don’t want to get involved with that.” Iraq Oil Report, Nov. 2011
Law of Administration For the State of Iraq For the Transitional Period, 2004
The Kurdistan Regional Government is recognized as the official government of the territories that were administered by that government on 19 March 2003 in the governorates of Dohuk, Arbil, Sulaimaniya, Kirkuk, Diyala and Neneveh. The term “Kurdistan Regional Government” shall refer to the Kurdistan National Assembly, the Kurdistan Council of Ministers, and the regional judicial authority in the Kurdistan region.
SOURCES
Hadi, Hemn, “Afren confirms major oil discovery in Kurdistan Region,” AK News, 5/17/12
International Crisis Group, “Iraq And The Kurds: The High-Stakes Hydrocarbons Gambit,” 4/19/12
Al-Jurani, Nabil, “Iraq boosts oil export capacity in Gulf,” Business Week, 4/20/12
Lando, Ben, “ALL ABOUT KURDISH OIL : Q&A: Ashti Hawrami, the Kurdish minister of natural resources,” Iraq Oil Report, 11/15/11
In a surprising move, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki reconciled with his Deputy Premier Saleh al-Mutlaq. The former called Maliki a dictator in December, which set off another crisis between the two politicians and their respective parties. Maliki had Mutlaq banned from the cabinet, and called for a no confidence vote. Mutlaq returned the favor calling for the prime minister to be removed. In the last several months however, the two have been holding quiet talks behind closed doors that eventually led to the deputy premier returning to work. This is another sign that Maliki continues to outplay his opponents, especially Mutlaq’s Iraqi National Movement (INM) that is beset by internal divisions.
Deputy Premier Mutlaq was reinstated to his office in May 2012 (Reuters)
Ironically, Mutlaq was a major player in putting together the government in Maliki’s second administration. In the 2010 election, Mutlaq’s INM won the most seats, but the prime minister was able to out maneuver it, and retain his position. The talks then centered upon how all the winning lists would split the spoils of power, namely the top positions. Mutlaq carried out his own independent negotiations with Maliki, and when he obtained the deputy premier’s office, he went to the National Movement’s leader Iyad Allawi, and told him that he needed to back the new coalition government or be left out. It’s this factious nature of the INM that has been its undoing since it was created. It was made out of too many different parties, each with its own leader, who brought to the table their own individual agendas. That’s the reason why Mutlaq was willing to pressure his own supposed leader Allawi into backing a government he didn’t like, because Mutlaq had already obtain his own post. Afterward, Mutlaq would go on to be one of the prime minster’s top critics after he helped return him to power.
The divisiveness of the National Movement was only emphasized by Mutlaq’s return. At the same time as he was retaking his position, there were a series of rumors that his Iraqi National Dialogue Front and others within the INM were going to lead a mass defection from the list. One report had as many as 25-30 lawmakers from the Solution Movement, the Iraqi Accordance Front, the Turkmen Front, and the Dialogue Front abandoning the INM to form their own list. They claimed they were disillusioned with the direction the National Movement was going, didn’t like their parliamentary leader Salman Ali Hassan Jumali, and believed their party bosses did not include them in decision making, and were making secret deals with the Kurds over the disputed territories in return for helping it oppose Maliki. Mutlaq coming to an understanding with the Prime Minister could be a sign that this split was going to occur, because it could mean that his Dialogue Front and the others were willing to give up their antagonistic stance towards the PM, and leave the INM. On the other ahnd, it could be just another episode of parliamentarians voicing their discontent with their leaders to pressure them to change their policies.
Many were caught off guard when Maliki tried to dismiss Mutlaq in December 2011, and were just as surprised when the two reconciled in May 2012. His return will not seriously affect the functioning of the government, because he had no real responsibility to begin with. It will undermine the Iraqi National Movement, which once again showed that it was easy to split by Maliki who has used the carrot and stick approach and divide and conquer tactics again and again against it to great affect. It could even change the mind of some commentators who have accused the prime minister of following a sectarian policy towards his opponents, when in fact he was going after specific personalities. Most importantly, it was a reflection of how firmly in control Maliki is, and how hopeless his opponents are.
SOURCES
AIN, “IS source: SLC offers Mutleg to resume his post,” 5/3/12
- “Khalidi denies reports over withdrawing Maliki’s request to dismiss Mutleg,” 5/10/12
- “MP: Foreign guarantees behind return of Iraqiya Slate to parliament,” 1/31/12
- “Mutleg: Not regretful over describing Maliki as “Dictator,”” 1/11/12
- “Mutleg resumes his duties at his office,” 5/16/12
- “Mutleg to resume his duties as Deputy Premier soon, says Batiekh,” 5/14/12
Ali, Husam, “MPs to vote on Deputy PM Mutlag sacking next week,” AK News, 2/19/12
Aswat al-Iraq, “Mutlaq’s case to be solved politically by the three presidencies, MP,” 2/25/12
On May 19, 2012 several dozen people showed up in Basra City in southern Iraq to protest outside the Turkish consulate there. They were demanding that Turkey turn over Vice President Tariq Hashemi who is currently residing in that country to escape an arrest warrant. The Federation of Trade Unions of Basra, the Movement of the Masses of Basra, and local tribal leaders (1) helped organize the demonstration. Participants burned the Turkish flag, chanted anti-Turkish slogans, and threatened to push the provincial council to cancel contracts with Turkey if Hashemi was not turned over in 15 days. There are hundreds Turkish firms doing business in the governorate. It’s not clear whether this protest was linked to any political parties, but it showed the deteriorating relations between Iraq and Turkey.
Recently, Turkish officials have taken the side of the Iraqi National Movement (INM) in its on-going dispute with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. In April 2012 for example, Turkish Premier Recep Erdogan hosted Kurdish President Massoud Barzani, and called Maliki sectarian and acting out of self-interest. Afterward, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry summoned the Turkish ambassador to complain about those comments. This dates back to the 2010 parliamentary election when Ankara backed the INM. It’s for those reasons that the May event could have been organized by groups linked with Maliki since Turkey is supporting his main rival. They could also just be an expression of popular discontent driven by current events.
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FOOTNOTES
1. Al-Aalem, “Demonstrators in Basra: 15 days before the Ankara for delivery or expulsion of its al-Hashemi and the District of goods,” 5/19/12
SOURCES
Al-Aalem, “Demonstrators in Basra: 15 days before the Ankara for delivery or expulsion of its al-Hashemi and the District of goods,” 5/19/12
Omhammed, Riyadh, “The Heart of Allawi’s Win,” At War, New York Times, 3/29/10
Radio Nawa, “Demonstrators in Basra, Turkey vows to close its consulate in the province if not delivered within two weeks Hashemi,” 5/19/12
Al-Rafidayn, “Iraqi protesters threaten to strike Turkish interests if it does not recognize Turkey to Baghdad al-Hashemi,” 5/19/12
Raphaeli, Dr. Nimrod, “Turkish and Iraqi Leaders At Loggerheads,” Middle East Media Research Institute, 5/2/12
Yusuf, Karwan, “Ministry condemns burning Turkish flag in Basra,” AK News, 5/20/12
