News items from Iraq

Iraq seeks seven-billion-dollar loan from IMF

AFP – Mon May 25, 7:00 pm ET

Mon May 25, 7:00 pm ET

BAGHDAD (AFP) – Iraq wants a seven-billion-dollar loan from theInternational Monetary Fund (IMF) to cover its budget deficit, Finance Minister Baqer Jabr Solagh said in an interview published on Monday.

Iraqi trade chief resigns amid corruption scandal

BAGHDAD By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press Writer – Mon May 25, 5:07 pm ET 

- Iraq's prime minister has accepted the resignation of his trade minister, shortly before a move in parliament to oust him over alleged corruption in his department, the government said Monday.

Iraq aims to allow foreign investors to own land

Reuters – Mon May 25, 1:40 pm ET

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's investment commission is pushing for foreign firms to be allowed to own land, a move seen as key to attracting the developers required to build houses and repair and expand the country's creaking infrastructure. 

Iraq soldier deaths trial resumes

BBC - Page last updated at 13:00 GMT, Monday, 25 May 2009 14:00 UK     

The accused men, Faisal Al Saadoon, 56, and Khalaf Mufdhi, 58, appeared at the Iraqi Higher Tribunal.

The panel of five presiding judges heard evidence from the first of the prosecution witnesses about what happened near the town of Al Zubayr at the end of March 2003.

But the BBC's Nicholas Witchell said that the evidence that this witness gave, anonymously and from behind a curtain, contradicted virtually everything he had told British Military Police when they investigated the killings.

The British Army say the two soldiers took a wrong turning, were ambushed by local militia and taken to the local Ba'ath party headquarters where, it is alleged, the two accused ordered them to be shot.