Iraq

28 May 2023; MEMO: Western-based Christian NGOs have been accused of exploiting the plight of northern Iraq's indigenous Yazidi community by trying to proselytise Christianity to them, according to a report yesterday by Middle East Eye (MEE)...

28 May 2023; MEMO: Iraq said that an electricity grid interconnection with Jordan will start production on July 1, reports Anadolu Agency.

"Production will start with a capacity of 50 megawatts in the first phase," Electricity Ministry spokesman Ahmed Moussa said in statements quoted by state news agency INA.

He said production had been scheduled to start in June but "was delayed due to weather conditions and arrangements on the Jordanian side."

BAGHDAD, May 26 (NNN-NINA) – Iraqi political leaders, met yesterday, with visiting Czech Foreign Minister, Jan Lipavsky, to discuss bilateral ties and economic cooperation.

During a meeting with a delegation led by Lipavsky, Iraqi Prime Minister, Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani, lauded the Czech role in supporting efforts of the Iraqi security forces, in combatting terrorism, the media office of the prime minister said, in a statement.

17 May 2023; MEMO: The late Iraqi President Saddam Hussein rejected a US proposal to name his vice president without power in return for his release, the head of Saddam's legal defence team has revealed. Khalil Al-Dulaimi told Al-Arabiya TV that the US also asked Saddam to stop fighting against US soldiers in Falluja and leave the country, but he refused.

BAGHDAD, May 10 (NNN-NINA) – Iraq recovered, yesterday, 6,000 antiquities that Britain borrowed 100 years ago “for scholarly purposes.”

In a press conference held at Baghdad airport, Iraqi President, Abdul Latif Rashid, told reporters that, these antiquities have been in Britain since 1923, and their return resulted from cooperation with the British Museum.

23 Apr 2023; MEMO: The US-led coalition forces against Daesh/ISIS said Saturday its drone crashed in northern Iraq, Anadolu reports.

The drone crashed due to a mechanical failure in Kirkuk, the Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTF–OIR) said in a statement.

Iraqi security forces quickly secured the site and coalition service members cleared the area with a controlled detonation.

BAGHDAD (AP) — There are places around Baghdad where I’ll sometimes say a silent prayer for the dead when I pass — on certain residential streets, at a particular restaurant, in a square where minibuses gather.

Today, people go about their daily business in these places, perhaps no longer thinking of the horror that took place years ago right where they are walking. For me, each site has become indelibly linked to the carnage I saw and the pain people suffered there.

17 Apr 2023; MEMO: Ukraine's Foreign Minister visited Iraq on Monday for the first time since Russia's invasion, seeking diplomatic support from the Middle East where Moscow has been cultivating friends, Reuters reports.

"We definitely see Iraq as a country that is capable of building bridges," Dmitro Kuleba said at a press conference alongside Iraq's Foreign Minister, Fuad Hussein.

13 Apr 2023; MEMO: Oil exports from the Kurdistan region of Iraq remain halted as Baghdad negotiates with Turkiye's government to re-open a pipeline linking the two countries, said an Iraqi official, Bloomberg reports.

According to the report, Turkiye has said it is carrying out maintenance work on a stretch of pipeline on its side of the border, along with some oil-storage tanks while the crude flows are halted.

BAGHDAD (AP) — Of his countless stories of his life as a hairdresser in Iraq, the one Qaiss al-Sharaa most enjoys retelling is about the day April 9, 2003, when he watched Iraqis and American Marines pull down the statue of Saddam Hussein in front of his salon in Baghdad’s Firdos Square.

The 12-meter (39-foot) statue of the Iraqi dictator extending his right hand had been erected just a year earlier to celebrate his 65th birthday.