Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Cement giant planning $450 mn. projects in Kerbala
Reconstruction
(Reuters) - Cement producer Lafarge is planning two projects worth about US$450 million in the Iraqi city of Kerbala, according to an investment bank working with the French company on both deals. The world's largest cement maker by market value is bidding for US$150 million contract to rehabilitate a cement plant in Kerbala with a capacity of 2 million tonnes a year, said Basil al-Rahim, managing partner of Merchant Bridge said.
Lafarge and Merchant Bridge have a licence to build another 2 million tonne-a-year plant in the city, Rahim said in Dubai, estimating that project was worth about US$300 million. "We are working on the cement plant licences in a joint venture with Lafarge and all the permits are in place," he said. A Lafarge spokeswoman declined to comment in Paris on Monday.
The Iraqi government has opened up the cement sector to foreign firms, hoping they will be keen to join in the reconstruction under way. The ministry of industry and minerals sold 19 licences for greenfield cement plants in 2005 as part of plans to raise Iraq's capacity to 25 million tonnes a year from about 17 million.
"Only three or four of those licensees have made progress like us," Rahim said. Egypt's Orascom Construction Industries operates one cement plant in Iraq and is due to complete a second by the end of 2007. Rahim said the Lafarge venture would find out next week whether it had been shortlisted to negotiate the rehabilitation of the second Kerbala plant.
Lafarge and Merchant Bridge have a licence to build another 2 million tonne-a-year plant in the city, Rahim said in Dubai, estimating that project was worth about US$300 million. "We are working on the cement plant licences in a joint venture with Lafarge and all the permits are in place," he said. A Lafarge spokeswoman declined to comment in Paris on Monday.
The Iraqi government has opened up the cement sector to foreign firms, hoping they will be keen to join in the reconstruction under way. The ministry of industry and minerals sold 19 licences for greenfield cement plants in 2005 as part of plans to raise Iraq's capacity to 25 million tonnes a year from about 17 million.
"Only three or four of those licensees have made progress like us," Rahim said. Egypt's Orascom Construction Industries operates one cement plant in Iraq and is due to complete a second by the end of 2007. Rahim said the Lafarge venture would find out next week whether it had been shortlisted to negotiate the rehabilitation of the second Kerbala plant.
Labels: cement plant, Kerbala, Lafarge, Merchant Bridge, Orascom Construction Industries
Monday, July 02, 2007
U.S. accuses Iran of masterminding attacks on coalition
Security
(Gulf News) - The US military in Iraq has accused Iran of masterminding attacks aimed at coalition troops in Iraq and for arming and training Shiite militants. Military spokesman Brigadier-General Kevin Bergner said that the information came from a top Hezbollah fighter who was recently captured in Iraq.
Bergner said that senior Iranian leaders know about the operations of Iran’s Qods Force in Iraq. "We also understand that senior Iraqi leaders have expressed their concerns to the Iranian government about the activities," he said. Bergner said the United States had discovered three small camps near Tehran where Iraqi militants were trained by Qods Force and Hezbollah operatives.
He said that the Qods Force was also involved in an attack in Kerbala in January when gunmen, disguised as Americans, entered a government compound and killed a US soldier and abducted four others whom they later killed. He added that the military has detained a Hezbollah veteran, Ali Mussa Daqduq, who was in Iraq to organise secret cells to mirror Hezbollah's structure in Lebanon.
Iran denies involvement in the violence in Iraq and blames the US-led invasion in 2003 for the bloodshed. Iran's Defence Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar dismissed the US claim as a "sheer lie". Iran does not officially acknowledge the existence of the Qods Force. Military experts say it is a wing of Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
Bergner said that senior Iranian leaders know about the operations of Iran’s Qods Force in Iraq. "We also understand that senior Iraqi leaders have expressed their concerns to the Iranian government about the activities," he said. Bergner said the United States had discovered three small camps near Tehran where Iraqi militants were trained by Qods Force and Hezbollah operatives.
He said that the Qods Force was also involved in an attack in Kerbala in January when gunmen, disguised as Americans, entered a government compound and killed a US soldier and abducted four others whom they later killed. He added that the military has detained a Hezbollah veteran, Ali Mussa Daqduq, who was in Iraq to organise secret cells to mirror Hezbollah's structure in Lebanon.
Iran denies involvement in the violence in Iraq and blames the US-led invasion in 2003 for the bloodshed. Iran's Defence Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar dismissed the US claim as a "sheer lie". Iran does not officially acknowledge the existence of the Qods Force. Military experts say it is a wing of Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
Labels: Ali Mussa Daqduq, Brigadier-General Kevin Bergner, Hezbollah, Iran, Kerbala, Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, Quds Force, Shia militias, U.S. military
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Round-up of violence across Iraq
Security
(Reuters) - Security developments in Iraq as of 0845 GMT on Saturday. Follow link for further information.
KERBALA - A suicide car bomber killed up to 50 people and wounded more than 70 at a bus station next to a crowded market in the Iraqi holy city of Kerbala, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed 10 civilians and wounded 15 when it exploded on southern Baghdad's Jadriyah Bridge, police said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen attacked the deputy industry minister's convoy and wounded three of his bodyguards in Baghdad's southwestern Jihad neighbourhood, police said. Deputy Minister Mohammed Abdullah was present but unhurt from the attack.
TAL AFAR - A sniper shot dead a civilian woman in the religiously mixed town of Tal Afar on Friday, police said.
BAGHDAD - Five bodies were found in different parts of Baghdad on Friday, police said.
Labels: assassination attempt, Baghdad, car bombs, Deputy Minister Mohammed Abdullah, Kerbala, sniper, Tal Afar
Suicide bombs in Karbala, Baghdad
Security
(Reuters) - A suicide car bomber killed at least 40 people and wounded 128 at a crowded bus station near a major Shi'ite shrine in the Iraqi holy city of Kerbala on Saturday, police and hospital sources said. In Baghdad, police said a suicide car bomber detonated his device before a checkpoint at the southern Jadriyah bridge, killing 10 people, wounding 15 and burning several cars in the second major attack on a bridge in the capital in the past two days.
Saturday's violence came a day after leaders from across Iraq's sectarian divide pleaded for unity as they gathered under high security at a special session of parliament to condemn a suicide bombing that tore through the building on Thursday.
A police source put the death toll in Kerbala, 110 km (70 miles) southwest of Baghdad, at 65. But Khaled al-Rubaie, media director of al-Husseini hospital in Kerbala, said 41 people had been killed and 128 wounded, many of them women and children. Salim Katham, media director of Kerbala's health directorate, said 32 people were killed and 58 wounded. The attack occurred near a crowded market and some 200 meters from the Imam Hussein shrine, where the grandson of Islam's Prophet Mohammad is buried -- one of the most important sites for Shi'ites.
Saturday's violence came a day after leaders from across Iraq's sectarian divide pleaded for unity as they gathered under high security at a special session of parliament to condemn a suicide bombing that tore through the building on Thursday.
A police source put the death toll in Kerbala, 110 km (70 miles) southwest of Baghdad, at 65. But Khaled al-Rubaie, media director of al-Husseini hospital in Kerbala, said 41 people had been killed and 128 wounded, many of them women and children. Salim Katham, media director of Kerbala's health directorate, said 32 people were killed and 58 wounded. The attack occurred near a crowded market and some 200 meters from the Imam Hussein shrine, where the grandson of Islam's Prophet Mohammad is buried -- one of the most important sites for Shi'ites.
Labels: car bomb, Jadriyah bridge, Kerbala
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Almost a million in the south are in dire need of help
Humanitarian
(IRIN) - Nearly a million displaced people in Iraq's increasingly volatile southern provinces are in urgent need of food, medicines and municipal services, local officials and NGOs say. Aid workers have called on international humanitarian organizations and the central government to provide more assistance to the growing numbers of displaced in the south of the country. "Najaf, Kerbala and Basra provinces, in particular, are greatly suffering with a continued increase in displacement. There are dozens of families arriving every day at camps for the displaced, causing a lack of essential needs such as food and health care," said Ali Fakhouri, a spokesman of Najaf provincial council. "The past two months were the worst for those families. For security reasons, the delivery of aid has decreased considerably and because of a lack in medicines in the region's hospitals and inaccessibility to hospitals, children are more vulnerable to diseases," Fakhouri added. "Diarrhea is common among children in displaced groups in the south."
There are dozens of families arriving every day at camps for the displaced, causing a lack of essential needs such as food and health care. Fakhouri said that nearly 90 percent of the 700,000 internally displaced people in the southern provinces lack essential needs. According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), of this total, at least 310,000 arrived there after the bombing on 22 February 2006 of a revered Shia shrine in the northern city of Samarra caused an escalation of sectarian violence. Fakhouri said that unofficial records suggest there are at least 200,000 more displaced people in the southern provinces, bringing the total to nearly a million. The economically poorer southern cities have few jobs to offer this massive influx of people. As such, the displaced are largely unemployed and depend on assistance from aid organisations.
There are dozens of families arriving every day at camps for the displaced, causing a lack of essential needs such as food and health care. Fakhouri said that nearly 90 percent of the 700,000 internally displaced people in the southern provinces lack essential needs. According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), of this total, at least 310,000 arrived there after the bombing on 22 February 2006 of a revered Shia shrine in the northern city of Samarra caused an escalation of sectarian violence. Fakhouri said that unofficial records suggest there are at least 200,000 more displaced people in the southern provinces, bringing the total to nearly a million. The economically poorer southern cities have few jobs to offer this massive influx of people. As such, the displaced are largely unemployed and depend on assistance from aid organisations.
Compounding the health problems the displaced face in Iraq's southern provinces is a lack of access to food. According to Ministry of Trade officials, the continuous movement of families to southern areas has caused delays in the delivery of food rations (distributed as aid by the Ministry of Trade to help poor families registered by the government). The result is many newly displaced people do not receive food rations "for a period of time because of technical arrangements", said Farhan. Based on information from Najaf provincial council, at least 120,000 people in the province have not received their food rations after fleeing their homes in Baghdad or neighboring cities.
Labels: Basra, IDPs, Kerbala, Najaf
