Friday, October 12, 2007
State Dept. may limit or phase out use of private security guards in Iraq
(AP) -- The State Department may phase out or limit the use of private security guards in Iraq, which could mean canceling Blackwater USA's contract or awarding it to another company in line with an Iraqi government demand, The Associated Press has learned. Such steps would be difficult given U.S. reliance on Blackwater and other contractors, but they are among options being studied during a comprehensive review of security in Iraq, two senior officials said.
Condoleezza Rice to order the top-to-bottom review from a commission headed by Patrick Kennedy, one of the State Department's most experienced management officials. Kennedy has been told to concentrate on several key issues, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the review is still under way. Among them:
-Changes to the rules of engagement under which State Department security contractors operate, particularly for approaching suspicious vehicles, which is at the crux of the Sept. 16 incident. Blackwater insists its guards were fired upon, although Iraqi witnesses and the Iraqi government maintain the guards opened fire with no provocation when a vehicle got too close.
-Whether Blackwater's secretive corporate culture, reputed to have encouraged a "cowboy-like mentality," has led to its employees being more likely to violate or stretch the existing rules than those of the two other private security firms, Dyncorp and Triple Canopy, the State Department uses in Iraq.
-Whether it's feasible to eliminate or drastically curtail the use of private foreign contractors to protect U.S. diplomats in Iraq. And, if so, how to replace them.
Rice is eager for changes and has already accepted and implemented initial steps Kennedy urged in a preliminary report last week. They included improving government oversight of Blackwater by having federal agents accompany convoys and installing video cameras in their vehicles. Officials in the tight-knit world of security operatives in Baghdad said Blackwater was preparing a reorganization and possible downsizing. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity. The company, based in Moyock, N.C., does not speak publicly about its operations or plans. Calls and e-mail messages left with Blackwater on Wednesday were not returned.
A top aide to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told the AP that Washington was considering the findings of the Iraqi government's report into the incident and calls for reform. "But so far there has been no concrete answer from the U.S. Embassy showing it was definitely going to drop Blackwater," the aide said. The aide said the al-Maliki government told the U.S. Embassy, "We will draft and pass laws that would lift the immunity on these security companies to stop their reckless behavior."
Kennedy has been in Iraq for nearly two weeks with one of three outside experts Rice named to the commission, Eric Boswell, a former diplomat and intelligence official. The other two, retired Army Gen. George Joulwan and former Ambassador Stapleton Roy, were being briefed on the mission at the State Department on Wednesday before heading to Baghdad.
The officials said Kennedy's team was not expected to recommend eliminating all private contractors because it would have a profound impact on how U.S. diplomats work in Iraq. The State Department's own Bureau of Diplomatic Security lacks both the manpower and equipment, notably helicopters, to do the job, they said.
Blackwater is now the biggest of the three firms working for the department in Iraq with about 1,000 employees and handles protection in and around Baghdad, the most dangerous areas of the country. It has been paid as much as $1 billion for its work in Iraq. Dyncorp and Triple Canopy, which work in the north and south, are far smaller and face resource constraints.
Under the terms of the department's Worldwide Personal Protective Security contract, which covers privately contracted guards for diplomats in Iraq, Blackwater, Dyncorp and Triple Canopy are the only three companies eligible to bid on specific task orders there. If Blackwater goes, the slack would almost certainly have to be picked up by one or more other companies, which may require certifying other firms to bid, including non-U.S. ones, the officials said.
Of interest to the department is the possibility of forming Iraqi companies with Iraqi employees to protect U.S. diplomats as local guards do for embassy staff in other countries, they said. That would bring the guards fully under the jurisdiction of Iraqi law but is not a short-term option given inadequate training facilities. The Pentagon has been reluctant to provide security for diplomats but another alternative might be joint State-Defense department patrols. Yet another would be hiring Blackwater and other private guards as temporary U.S. government employees, the officials said.
Condoleezza Rice to order the top-to-bottom review from a commission headed by Patrick Kennedy, one of the State Department's most experienced management officials. Kennedy has been told to concentrate on several key issues, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the review is still under way. Among them:
-Changes to the rules of engagement under which State Department security contractors operate, particularly for approaching suspicious vehicles, which is at the crux of the Sept. 16 incident. Blackwater insists its guards were fired upon, although Iraqi witnesses and the Iraqi government maintain the guards opened fire with no provocation when a vehicle got too close.
-Whether Blackwater's secretive corporate culture, reputed to have encouraged a "cowboy-like mentality," has led to its employees being more likely to violate or stretch the existing rules than those of the two other private security firms, Dyncorp and Triple Canopy, the State Department uses in Iraq.
-Whether it's feasible to eliminate or drastically curtail the use of private foreign contractors to protect U.S. diplomats in Iraq. And, if so, how to replace them.
Rice is eager for changes and has already accepted and implemented initial steps Kennedy urged in a preliminary report last week. They included improving government oversight of Blackwater by having federal agents accompany convoys and installing video cameras in their vehicles. Officials in the tight-knit world of security operatives in Baghdad said Blackwater was preparing a reorganization and possible downsizing. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity. The company, based in Moyock, N.C., does not speak publicly about its operations or plans. Calls and e-mail messages left with Blackwater on Wednesday were not returned.
A top aide to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told the AP that Washington was considering the findings of the Iraqi government's report into the incident and calls for reform. "But so far there has been no concrete answer from the U.S. Embassy showing it was definitely going to drop Blackwater," the aide said. The aide said the al-Maliki government told the U.S. Embassy, "We will draft and pass laws that would lift the immunity on these security companies to stop their reckless behavior."
Kennedy has been in Iraq for nearly two weeks with one of three outside experts Rice named to the commission, Eric Boswell, a former diplomat and intelligence official. The other two, retired Army Gen. George Joulwan and former Ambassador Stapleton Roy, were being briefed on the mission at the State Department on Wednesday before heading to Baghdad.
The officials said Kennedy's team was not expected to recommend eliminating all private contractors because it would have a profound impact on how U.S. diplomats work in Iraq. The State Department's own Bureau of Diplomatic Security lacks both the manpower and equipment, notably helicopters, to do the job, they said.
Blackwater is now the biggest of the three firms working for the department in Iraq with about 1,000 employees and handles protection in and around Baghdad, the most dangerous areas of the country. It has been paid as much as $1 billion for its work in Iraq. Dyncorp and Triple Canopy, which work in the north and south, are far smaller and face resource constraints.
Under the terms of the department's Worldwide Personal Protective Security contract, which covers privately contracted guards for diplomats in Iraq, Blackwater, Dyncorp and Triple Canopy are the only three companies eligible to bid on specific task orders there. If Blackwater goes, the slack would almost certainly have to be picked up by one or more other companies, which may require certifying other firms to bid, including non-U.S. ones, the officials said.
Of interest to the department is the possibility of forming Iraqi companies with Iraqi employees to protect U.S. diplomats as local guards do for embassy staff in other countries, they said. That would bring the guards fully under the jurisdiction of Iraqi law but is not a short-term option given inadequate training facilities. The Pentagon has been reluctant to provide security for diplomats but another alternative might be joint State-Defense department patrols. Yet another would be hiring Blackwater and other private guards as temporary U.S. government employees, the officials said.
Labels: Ambassador Stapleton Roy, Army Gen. George Joulwan, Blackwater, DynCorp, Eric Boswell, Nouri Al-Maliki, Patrick Kennedy, Triple Canopy, Worldwide Personal Protective Security contract
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Triple Canopy receives $5.6 mn. internal security services contract
Contracts
Security contractor Triple Canopy in Herndon, VA received a sole source a $5.6 million firm-fixed-price contract for internal security services in Iraq. The contract will be complete by Aug. 1, 2008, and was initiated on July 25, 2007 by The Joint Contracting Command in Baghdad, Iraq (W91GDW-07-A-4003).
Labels: internal security services, Iraq contracts, Triple Canopy
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
U.N. on offensive against Iraq "mercenaries" recruited in Chile
Security
(IPS) - Mercenary recruitment agencies that send former soldiers to Iraq have been accused in Chile of human right abuses, illegal association, possession of explosives and unauthorised use of army weaponry, and are the target of a special United Nations mission.
The UN Working Group (UNWG) on the "use of mercenaries as a means of violating human rights and impeding the exercise of the right of peoples to self-determination", established in July 2005 by the then UN Commission on Human Rights, conducted a fact-finding mission about the recruitment firms in Chile this week, and then planned to head to Montevideo.
Senator Alejandro Navarro, of the governing coalition Socialist Party, is the prime mover behind the visit by the delegation, which arrived in Santiago on Monday. He stated that these firms declare legal residence in Uruguay, and that contracts are signed in international airspace while the mercenaries are being flown to the Middle East. A Jordanian city has also been named as a venue where contracts are signed.
Some of these contracts designate the Conciliation and Arbitration Centre of Panama (CeCAP), linked to Panama's Chamber of Commerce, as the arbiter in case of any dispute, said Navarro, who had negotiated for two years for the UNWG to visit Chile. Navarro said that U.S. private security companies such as Blackwater and Triple Canopy, who recruit guards at the request of the U.S. government to send into armed conflict zones to protect strategic installations, tend to subcontract to South American firms like Red Táctica Consulting Group.
The owner of the Washington-based Red Táctica is José Miguel Pizarro, a retired general of the Chilean army who lives in the U.S. He is also known as a commentator on Iraq security issues for the U.S. news service CNN.
According to Navarro's estimates, close to 1,200 former members of the Chilean military, mostly retired and with an average age of 40, have gone to Iraq since 2004. They were recruited by private companies who operate in several different countries in order to evade future responsibilities, he said. Sources in Santiago estimate that there are currently 500 Chilean mercenaries there, while Navarro says there are 1,000.
So far, no Chileans have been reported killed in Iraq, but some of them have complained of irregularities and abuse. Daniel Maturana, a 28-year-old former Chilean army soldier, told the UNWG his story Tuesday, which had been broadcast by the media two years ago after Navarro reported it. Maturana said he was contacted in 2005 by Global Guard, another company owned by Pizarro, to work as a guard in a "secure installation" in Iraq, such as an embassy or an airport. He was offered the attractive salary of 2,800 dollars a month for six months, plus 250 dollars for travelling expenses and paid holidays.
Maturana accepted and boarded a private charter plane to the Middle East, along with one of his brothers, also an ex-soldier, and 160 other Chilean mercenaries. He signed the contract on board the flight, but to his surprise the pay stipulated was only 1,000 dollars a month. "Pizarro told us: 'If you don't like it, get off the plane,'" Maturana told IPS. After a 30-hour journey, during which they ate only bread and water, they arrived in Jordan, where the group was divided up. Maturana and his brother were sent to guard a U.S.-British diplomatic mission in a location near Baghdad, where they carried war weapons: an AK-47 assault rifle and five spare magazines containing 30 rounds each.
Although he said he was treated well by Triple Canopy, the firm that subcontracted Global Guard's services, Maturana was indignant when he found out how much profit Pizarro was making. The U.S. firm paid Pizarro between 8,000 and 15,000 dollars a month for each mercenary, more than 10 times what they were getting. "He pocketed about 10,000 dollars for every one of us," he said.
The former soldier says that Triple Canopy offered him a job with them at 15,000 dollars a month, because of his professionalism. But Pizarro did not like this move at all, and physically assaulted the two brothers, kidnapping them for six days, after which they were rescued by Fijian guards. They returned to Chile without having been paid any of their wages. Another of their brothers, who had travelled to Iraq later on, also had difficulty in leaving the country. Maturana said Pizarro's firm was "a mafia", but he defended the work he did in Iraq. "I think it's degrading to say that former members of the Chilean military are mercenaries, because that isn't the case. I wasn't a mercenary or a hired killer, I didn't kill Iraqis, I just protected buildings and people," he said.
On the occasion of the UNWG visit, Senator Navarro met with Defence Minister José Goñi, who told him that the Chilean government has every intention of signing and ratifying the 1989 Convention. "Now it's in the hands of the Foreign Office, which hasn't so far regarded it as a priority," Navarro said. The results of the experts' investigations will be presented to the Human Rights Council and the UN General Assembly in September.
Labels: Alejandro Navarro, Blackwater Security Consulting, Chile, Daniel Maturana, Global Guard, human rights abuse, Jordan, Red Táctica Consulting Group, Triple Canopy, UNWG, Uruguay
