LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Iraq
built 628 days ago
One key issue that currently confronts economic policymakers in Iraq is inflation. The year-on-year inflation rate for 2006 was 64.8%, a significant increase over the 2005 rate of 31.6% and well above the IMF target rate of 30% annual inflation. In an effort to infuse some stability in prices in Iraq, the Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) began to appreciate the Iraqi Dinar (ID) relative to the U.S. Dollar (USD) in November 2006. As of June 7, the CBI had appreciated the ID by 17%. It has ... accelerated interest rate increases; the deposit rate is currently 20%. Inflation in Iraq, however, is only partly a monetary problem, and is more strongly related to real sector effects, particularly bottlenecks resulting from the security situation.
Source:
Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, is the largest city in the country, with a population of five million. Basra, the second largest city, has a population of more than a million and half, and is the gateway to the Persian Gulf. Mosul, in the north, is the third largest city, and has a population of more than a million. Kirkuk City... in the north, has more than half a million people. It is situated among major oil reserves. In addition to these cities, Iraq is the site of several Shiʿite holy cities, including alNajaf, where Imam Ali is buried, and Karbala, where Imam Husayn is buried.
Source:
Iraq has a diverse population. It is 80 percent Arab, with its non-Arabic-speaking groups comprising Kurds (a significant 15 percent of the population), Turkomans, and Assyrians. Iraq's population is 97 percent Muslim, 65 percent of which is Shi‘a. (Chibli Mallat breaks down the population somewhat differently: 55-60 percent Arab Shi‘a, 15-20 percent Arab Sunni, and 20 percent Sunni Kurds.) Prior to 1920, these three groups had no shared experience of living together within a modern state system. While all shared Ottoman rulers, the Basra province was distinct from the Baghdad province, and the province of Mosul in the north remained a disputed territory claimed for some years by Turkey. Iraq was so fractured that when the Ottoman empire collapsed, neighborhoods in the southern city of Najaf separately declared their independence and wrote separate constitutions.
Source:
Long before September 11, before the first inspections in Iraq had started, a small group of influential officials and experts in Washington were calling for regime change in Iraq. Many are now administration officials. This article assembles links to the key documents produced since 1992 by this group, usually known as neo-conservatives, and analysis of their efforts.
Source:
In l984 the U.S. Export-Import Bank began extending short-term -- up to one-year -- loans to Iraq for the purchase of U.S. manufactured goods. In the 1970s, the Export-Import Bank had been authorized to do business with Iraq, but that authority was terminated when, in l979, the U.S. State Department placed Iraq on the list of countries found to be sponsoring terrorism. In l983, the State Department removed Iraq from this list after Iraq expelled the Abu Nidal Black June terrorist group. By then... the Export-Import Bank shared many of the commercial banks' reservations about lending to Iraq. It resumed operations only at the insistence of the Reagan administration, under what one Bank official described to Middle East Watch as "political pressure." In l984 and l985, the Bank made some $35 million in short-term loans to Iraq but discontinued the program after Iraqi borrowers failed to meet repayment schedules.
Source:
In March 2003, a United States-organized coalition invaded Iraq, with the stated reason that Iraq had failed to abandon its nuclear and chemical weapons development program in violation of United Nations resolution 687. When Iraq invaded Kuwait during the first Gulf War, the United Nations Security Council, under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, adopted resolution 678, authorizing U.N. member states to use "all necessary means" to "restore international peace and security in the area." After Iraq was expelled from Kuwait the United Nations passed a cease-fire resolution 687. The agreement included provisions obligating Iraq to discontinue its nuclear weapons program. The United States asserted that because Iraq was in "material breach" of resolution 687, the armed forces authorization of resolution 678 was revived.
Source:
MORE ABOUT
Iraq