British say calm Iraq polls key to Basra investment - Reuters

By Mohammed Abbas

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraq's elections this week will be a crucial test of whether the oil-rich but dilapidated city of Basra is ready for the international investment it desperately needs, British officials said.

Once overrun by gangs and militias vying for control of Iraq's second biggest city, Basra is now quite calm after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered a military crackdown last year.
If the peace holds during provincial polls Saturday, it could mark a turning point for the city.
"The business world is looking quite closely at Basra now, and the elections," the British Consul General in Basra, Nigel Haywood, told Reuters.

"If they go well, that would be a big sign that Basra really is open for business. Obviously the converse may be true (but) the signs are very good at the moment," he added.

Under an agreement with Iraq, British combat troops stationed in Basra province will withdraw by July 31, six years after joining the U.S. invasion to topple Saddam Hussein. They have already pulled back from the city to the nearby airport.

Basra has Iraq's only ports, and most of Iraq's current oil production comes from oilfields in and around the province.

Yet it is strewn with rubbish and pools of sewage, and vast slums have mushroomed around the city. For years after the 2003 invasion, rampant kidnappings and killings kept investors away.
Basra residents say the local council, elected in Iraq's first provincial polls in 2005, has provided little.

A calm election will be key, the British military said.

"If they can get through the election and the Iraqi security forces can deliver a safe post-election scenario, then we can say Basra is stable, and resilient," British military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Dickie Winchester said.

The elections are being supervised and organized by Iraq, but the British are ready to provide support if asked. There are 4,100 British troops in Iraq, and a residual contingent will remain in the country to train local forces after July.

There have been no indications of a surge of violence before or after the polls, said Winchester.
"The security situation is good, it's improving all the time, and with a new provincial council, that should ensure future delivery of economic success," he said.

But one potential British investor said the new council must quickly prove it could deliver improvements after the vote.

"If there is no significant delivery. Then it will blow up," said the investor, who was on a research trip to Basra and declined to be named. "We're not out of the woods yet, we're in the thick of them."

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Sovereign at last - Times

As the Iraqi Government takes over control of the capital, the US readiness to learn from past mistakes is rapidly leading to a more normal country

The formal handover yesterday to Iraqi control of the green zone, the fortified centre of Baghdad, is a defining moment in the long and bloody struggle to bring order and stability to a country wrecked by thirty years of dictatorship and five years of internecine violence. To Iraqis, to Americans and to a sceptical Muslim world, it symbolises a welcome restoration of sovereignty, a recognition of the huge progress made in recent months and a confirmation that democracy is, at last, taking root.

At an emotional ceremony to mark the raising of the Iraqi flag over the entrance to the former palace of Saddam Hussein, Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, declared that the day marked “the beginning of the process to retrieve every inch of our nation's soil”. He is right. And he is right to be proud. Few would have predicted even two years ago that Iraq would overcome the violent sectarian confrontations or that it had any viable future as a unitary state. According to official Health Ministry figures, 16,232 Iraqis were killed in 2007. Last year that total had dropped to 5,379 - less than a third, although still an average of nearly 15 people a day.

The comprehensive military agreement with America, ratified by the Iraqi parliament in November, does more than simply hand over control of the capital's security to the Iraqi Army. It also lays down a timetable for the US troop withdrawal, revokes their power to detain Iraqis without an Iraqi warrant, and subjects contractors and off-duty US soldiers to Iraqi law. Taken together, the measures underline that, from the beginning of this year, the 146,000-strong US force operates in Iraq under the authority of the Baghdad Government and no longer because of the 2003 invasion and subsequent occupation. This is of huge psychological importance in restoring national pride, in normalising Iraq's relationships with the US and other Western countries to whom it exports oil and in demolishing al-Qaeda's portrayal of the Iraqi Government as a puppet of Washington.

The handover of the green zone coincides with the expiry of the UN resolution, passed months after the invasion, legitimising US troops in Iraq. That applied equally to the British and the few other remaining forces. Yesterday Britain therefore also surrendered to the Iraqi Transport Ministry control of Basra airport, and a similar handover ceremony was held near to the base where the remaining 4,100 British troops await their final evacuation in July. A handful will stay on as military advisers, and a larger contingent of Americans will also continue to train and advise the Iraqi military. Indeed, the US will withdraw from its present checkpoint duties only gradually, in co-ordination with the Iraqis taking over. This makes political and operational sense.

To those who criticised the US forces' ineptitude, ignorance and naivety that marked the first years of occupation, it may be hard to admit that life has improved so noticeably thanks largely to the American readiness to learn from mistakes. Recent strategy, tactics and local understanding have gone a long way in removing grievances, winning tribal support and isolating the terrorists posing as champions of national liberation.

It is too early, however, to expect recognition or gratitude from most Iraqis. The mood was well symbolised by the journalist who threw his shoes at President Bush. Iraqis will be scarred for years by the terrorism, violence and sectarian hatred that has killed thousands and driven hundreds of thousands into exile. Most people will feel safer and happier only when the bombings cease, the electricity is constant and normal life returns to the streets. Since yesterday, however, they control all Baghdad's streets. The end of Iraq's agony is now in sight.

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Youth-into-work scheme at Khor Az Zubayr

Her Majesty’s Ambassador to Iraq, Christopher Prentice, was in Basra this week to visit the Khor Az Zubayr VOTEC, a new youth-into-work scheme aimed at tackling the high levels of unemployment amongst the city's young people.

The Basra Development Commission has masterminded the project with 50 local employers. Up to 500 trainees aged 16 to 30 will start vocational courses in October at three colleges that are being supported by the city's private sector.

In time it is expected that each of the colleges will take between 3 to 4,000 trainees a year. The UK Government is providing funding of £250,000 to help the scheme get off the ground.