Iraq has halted oil exports to Austria's OMV, Central Europe's leading oil and gas group, to protest a deal with the autonomous Kurdish region. An official at the Oil Ministry said OMV will no longer receive 10,000 barrels per day of Basra Light crude. In November, OMV signed two production-sharing contracts with the Kurdish authorities for two exploration blocs, Mala Omar and Shorish, in Irbil. South Korea's SK Energy was also cut off because of deals with the Kurdish government. SK Energy refused to abandon its exploration blocs in Kurdistan as part of a consortium led by the state-run Korea National Oil Corp.

Financial support is urgently needed for the satellite TV station that is broadcasting voices for the secular and democratic reconstruction of Iraq!
Financial difficulties are hitting Sana TV, an Iraqi satellite TV station, which is covering the people’s struggles to end the occupation and reconstruct a secular and democratic Iraq.

From Bush's final State of the Union address, via the New York Times:

Ladies and gentlemen, some may deny the surge is working, but among the terrorists there is no doubt. Al Qaeda is on the run in Iraq, and this enemy will be defeated...

In a front-page story Jan. 25, "US Asking Iraq for Wide Rights in Fighting War," the New York Times writes: "With its international mandate in Iraq set to expire in 11 months, the Bush administration will insist that the government in Baghdad give the United States broad authority to conduct combat operations and guarantee civilian contractors specific legal protections from Iraqi law, according to administration and military officials... The American negotiating position for a formal military-to-military relationship, one that would replace the current United Nations mandate, is laid out in a draft proposal that was described by White House, Pentagon, State Department and military officials on ground rules of anonymity. It also includes less controversial demands that American troops be immune from Iraqi prosecution, and that they maintain the power to detain Iraqi prisoners." Meanwhile, a video posted on YouTube of a Jan. 3 appearance in Derry, NH, has presidential candidate John McCain responding to a question about whether US troops could be in Iraq 50 years: "Make it 100. We've been in Japan for 60 years, we've been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That would be fine with me."

Further evidence of the humbling of the neocons comes in George Bush's hailing of the new Iraqi law allowing former Baath Party members into public life. The party was declared illegal by the US-led administration after the invasion of 2003 when the noecons were riding high, and thousands of its members lost their jobs—contributing to the rise of the insurgency and the collapse of law and order. Now Bush says of the law reversing this policy: "It's an important step towards reconciliation. It's an important sign that the leaders of that country understand that they must work together to meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people." (BBC, Jan. 13) However, high-level Baathists are still barred under the new law. (NYT, Jan. 13) From clandestinity, Baath Party spokesman Abu Mohammad issued a statement dismissing the new law as just "changing the name of the first law" and "an attempt to beautify the nature of fascism... This will not change the objective of the Baath Party of continuing the resistance hand in hand with other resistance factions." (Uruknet, Jan. 12)

A woman carried out a suicide bombing near a Shi'ite mosque in Iraq's Diyala province Jan. 16, killing at least eight people. The attack provoked local Shi'ite militia fighters to use mortars against a nearby Sunni village in retaliation. Shi'ite worshipers in the village of Khan Bani Saad were preparing for Ashura festivities. (NYT, Jan. 17) On Jan. 17, a suicide bomber killed eight and wounded 14 near a Shi'ite mosque in Baquba, Diyala's capital. (Reuters, Jan. 17)

A petition from the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), Jan. 5:

The southern cities of Iraq which are totally under the grip of Islamist parties have turned into no-woman zones. Female physical appearance is not acceptable in the streets, educational institutions, or at work places. Although veiled and passive, death awaits women around street corners, in the market, and visits them inside their homes daily in the city of Basra.

Two suicide attacks in Iraq killed at least 56 and wounded at least 42 this week—days after the US military delivered an upbeat report on security in the country, boasting that levels of violence had dropped over the past year. A female suicide bomber attacked a checkpoint of US-backed anti-al-Qaeda neighborhood patrol volunteers Jan. 2 in Baquba, the capital of Diyala province. The attack killed 10 and wounded eight. On Jan. 3, a suicide bombing killed 36 and wounded at least 35 in Baghdad's Zayouna neighborhood—the deadliest in the capital since August. The target was a crowd that had gathered to mourn a teacher killed with six others in a car bombing four days earlier in the crowded intersection at Tayaran Square (CSM, Jan. 2)