Juan Cole

Iranian Pilgrims set to come to Iraq Iranian television announced that Iran would open its borders next week to Iranian pilgrims who wish to visit the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala in Iraq, according to al-Sharq al-Awsat. (There are already many illegal pilgrimages, but some have died trying to sneak through rugged territory, which […]

Cheney and Halliburton Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) “said public records show that Cheney, former chief executive officer of Halliburton, collected $367,000 in deferred salary from the company in 2001 and 2002, and is scheduled to receive sizable payments this year and in 2004 and 2005. In addition, the New Jersey Democrat said Cheney’s financial disclosure […]

Border Alerts against Infiltrators US forces are attempting to patrol Iraq’s huge borders with special care these days, reports al-Sharq al-Awsat. From all accounts, it appears that the US military had some sort of indication that infiltrators are trying to get into the country to carry off some large attack. The day before yesterday, the […]

No post-1998 Nuclear Weapons Program in Iraq The Iraqis never tried to revive their nuclear weapons program after the UN inspectors dismantled it, according to senior Iraqi scientists. (This is obvious, by the way: a nuclear weapons program would involve buildings the size of a football field, hundreds of scientists, and would be impossible to […]

Benign Autocracy in Iraq is a Recipe for Disaster My entry in an email discussion of the proposal made by Ray Takeyh and Nikolas Gvosdev that “Benign Autocracy Is Answer for Iraq” in the LA Times recently: Email is probably an insufficiently sophisticated instrument for discussing these complicated matters, but let me just clarify what […]

US Soldier, Khalidiya Police Chief Killed Guerillas Monday killed a 1st Armored Division soldier in central Baghdad with rpg fire as he was patrolling. In the western town of Khalidiya, three men assassinated Col .Khedeir Mekhalef Ali, police chief in al-Khaldiya.

High Baathist official Held in Najaf Bombing Kareem Ghatheeth, a Baath Party “Security Director,” was captured recently in Najaf by Badr Corps militiament in a firefight. They say that he is the mastermind behind the Najaf truck bombing of Aug. 29 that killed Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim, head of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in […]

New Private Television Company in Iraq It was announced Monday that IBC, a privately owned corporation in Iraqi hands, would launch the first privately owned television network in Iraq. (Although Turkey has privately owned television stations, the rest of the Arab world with the exception of Lebanon does not. Media is a government monopoly in […]

Turkmen Choose Leader Sami Shabak, a prominent member of the governing council of the Iraq Turkmen Front, angrily resigned Monday, accusing the party of being under the influence of the Turkish government and of taking outside direction in pursuing confrontations with the local Kurdish population. (-al-Sharq al-Awsat). The Iraq Turkmen Front voted in Kirkuk on […]