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Countdown starts for arrival of UN team in Iraq as Japan beefs up mission

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54anickel Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-30-04 05:37 PM
Original message
Countdown starts for arrival of UN team in Iraq as Japan beefs up mission
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_world/view/68801/1/.html

BAGHDAD : The countdown for the arrival of a UN team in Iraq began after UN chief Kofi Annan said it could be here within days and as Japan beefed up its mission to the country.

Britain, meanwhile, insisted that the hunt for Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) must go on after the White House acknowledged "limitations" in the intelligence that led to the war that toppled the Iraqi president last April.

The US-led coalition's deputy operations chief said coalition forces were bracing themselves for possible violence timed to coincide with the Muslim Eid al-Adha festival starting Sunday as the violent insurgency continues in Iraq.

"We've done some intelligence gathering for the Eid period and we remain fully prepared to handle any security threats over that time period," US Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt told reporters Friday.

more...
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Jacobin Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-30-04 05:40 PM
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1. I guess the Japanese troops have their bodyguards in place
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1381&blz=1

Japan Reportedly Paying Y10 Billion (75,052,849 EUR) to Iraqis to Guard SDF

2004-01-26 | TOKYO — The Japanese government is reportedly paying approximately 10 billion yen to Iraqi tribal leaders to provide bodyguards for the Self-defense Forces in Iraq.

A spokesman for the Prime Minister's Office said: "It is rather cheap if we can buy security for our soldiers with that amount of money. In Iraq, oil money is distributed to those tribes. It is more important for the Japanese government to make one-time payments to the leaders than to pay them a salary. That will help their local economy and benefit Japan's foreign policy toward new Iraq."

-snip-

Last year, Abdul Amir Rikaabi, the powerful leader of an Iraqi tribe, visited Japan and Koizumi made a confidential agreement with him in which Japan would pay a huge amount of money in exchange for protection, according to a source in the Prime Minister's Office.

"Mr Rikaabi told us that he would organize 200 to 300 guards to protect Japan's SDF soldiers until the main unit arrived in Samawah. The SDF will construct their camps within double barbed wire entanglements in the suburbs of Samawah and engage in supplying water to the city. The Iraqi guards will provide 24-hour patrols and in the event of a terrorist attack, Dutch troops will help out," said the source.

Disclaimer: I don't blame them. I'm sure SmirkCo turned the screws on Japan to force them to send some "troops" and so they are there as a fig leaf for SmirkCo's occupation of the oil fields.
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The_Casual_Observer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Jan-30-04 05:48 PM
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2. I'll bet they are "beefing up"
Sitting around in some hardened barracks all day with nothing to do but eat & sleep.
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