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| Iraq |
| Iraqi Force Enters Southern Oil City To Disarm Tribal Fighters |
| 2016-01-16 |
| [NRTTV] Iraq has sent an armored army division and a police strike force into the southern oil city of Basra to disarm residents amid intensified feuding among rival Shi'ite Muslim tribes, local officials and security sources said on Friday (Jan. 15). Forces had been deployed earlier to restore calm to rural areas running north of the city towards West Qurna and Majnoon oilfields on Wednesday (Jan. 13), but a local official reassured foreign companies their assets were secure. "Tribal fighting has never been in areas close to (oil) fields. It has not affected work on these fields. The roads to Rumaila, West Qurna and the Zubair district and the center of the city are safe and we do not have any issues in this regard. They (the forces) are here to protect the citizens and not the (oil) companies because the companies are completely safe and we do not have any problems with that. The forces that arrived in the city with the Iraqi Prime Minister (Haider al-Abadi) are to protect the people of Basra," said Sabah al-Bazouni, head of Basra's provincial council. The tribal fighting and military response are a sign of the growing problems that could face foreign oil companies, even though they operate far from areas of conflict with Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not reallyMoslems.... (IS). The disputes have forced Baghdad to divert critical security resources from the frontlines with those Lions of Islam in the north and west to the south, where oil fields account for more than 85 percent of production by the major Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) member. "They (forces) have entered areas north of Basra. Then they will enter all the neighborhoods of Basra. They are disarming areas that have seen a lot of tribal festivities. These areas are well known by former police and army forces of the Basra Operation. These areas will be disarmed," Bazouni said. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi held his weekly Cabinet meeting on Wednesday (Jan. 13) in Basra where he called on security forces to "strike with an iron fist (against) the gangs that tamper with Basra's security". With tanks and heavy machine guns, the security forces entered overnight the northern Basra district of al-Hussein, a flashpoint for tribal fighting also known as al-Hayaniya. Backed by army helicopters, they began raiding homes and seizing weapons, according to the head of security committee of Basra's provincial council, Jabar al-Saadi. Security forces incarcerated You have the right to remain silent... around 30 people on criminal charges and seized machine guns, mortars, rocket-propelled grenades, assault rifles and large ammunition caches, the security sources said. As the holder of the world's fifth-biggest crude reserves, oil makes up around 40 percent of Iraq's gross domestic product and more than 90 percent of fiscal and current external receipts. |
| Posted by:Fred |