Embassy in Iraq may cut Blackwater ties

Embassy in Iraq may cut Blackwater ties
By Steven R. Hurst and Qassim Abdul-Zahra - The Associated Press
Posted : Sunday Oct 14, 2007 15:17:52 EDT

BAGHDAD — U.S. and Iraqi officials are negotiating Baghdad’s demand that security company Blackwater USA be expelled from the country within six months, and American diplomats appear to be working on how to fill the security gap if the company is phased out.

The talks about Blackwater’s future in Iraq flow from recommendations in an Iraqi government report on the incident Sept. 16 when, Iraqi officials determined, Blackwater guards opened fire without provocation in Baghdad’s Nisoor Square and killed 17 Iraqi citizens.

The Iraqi investigators issued five recommendations to the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, which has since sent them to the U.S. Embassy as demands for action.

Point No. 2 in the report says:

“The Iraqi government should demand that the United States stops using the services of Blackwater in Iraq within six months and replace it with a new, more disciplined organization that would be answerable to Iraqi laws.”

Sami al-Askari, a top aide to al-Maliki, said that point in the Iraqi list of demands was nonnegotiable.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/10/ap_blackwaterembassy_071014/



uhc comment: Any bets on what the new name will be?