Orientul Mijlociu

Trump administration policy toward Iraq was a subset of the “maximum pressure” strategy applied toward neighboring Iran. U.S. officials evaluated Iraq’s leaderships primarily on its willingness to rein in the several Iran-backed Shia militias that were instrumental in beating back the Islamic State challenge but later sought the expulsion of U.S. forces from Iraq. The Trump Administration also pressured Iraqi officials to find alternative sources of electricity and natural gas and to impound payments to Iran for those commodities.

Three nongovernmental organizations based in France, Syria, and Russia have announced a legal case in Moscow against the Vagner Group, a Russian military contractor with indirect ties to the country’s political elite, over the 2017 torture of a detainee in Syria.

“This litigation is a first-ever attempt by the family of a Syrian victim to hold Russian suspects accountable for serious crimes committed in Syria,” the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression, and the Moscow-based Memorial Human Rights Center said in a joint statement on March 15.

International deliveries of arms were flat from 2016 through 2020 compared with the previous five-year period, but they were still close to the highest level since the end of the Cold War, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in a report released on March 15.

Three of the top five arms exporters — the United States, France, and Germany — increased deliveries from 2016 to 2020, but a decline in exports from Russia and China offset the rise, SIPRI said in its latest review of global arms transfers.

The Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR) said on Thursday that it documented the killing of at least 102 civilians during the month of September, in illegal operations by parties to the conflict and the controlling forces in Syria.

SNHR stated in its report that at least 102 civilians — including 15 children, 10 women, and three medical personnel — were killed this September by those involved in the conflict and the controlling forces in Syria, indicating that suicide bombings and booby traps were the main reason behind the deaths.

On Tuesday, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad issued a decree granting hundreds of thousands of public sector workers and soldiers a one-time financial stimulus, equivalent to an average monthly salary.

The stimulus — the third since October — comes as the national currency is crashing, now at 4,000 Syrian pounds to the dollar on the black market, compared to 700 a year ago. The official rate for the dollar is fixed at 1,256 pounds for 1 dollar.

782 suspects of terrorism and drug trafficking have been arrested in the governorates of Basra, Nineveh, Al-Anbar and Saladin in 2020.

A security source in the Iraqi Military Intelligence Directorate on Tuesday revealed to Shafaq News Agency that 48 wholesalers of illegal drugs was arrested, and thousands of narcotic pills known as “01” and drug crystals were seized.

A group of international NGOs and Iraq’s civil societies, including Nobel Peace laureate Nadia Murad, has taken the occasion of the visit of Pope Francis to Iraq to appeal for concrete commitments for protecting Iraq’s minority communities.

Governments in the Middle East have a valid reason to be concerned about the nuclear deal. They have already witnessed its negative consequences.

[T]his would have not been the outcome if Israel and other regional powers had been part of the negotiations.

The composition of the current negotiating team, similar to the previous one, completely excludes those on Iran’s doorstep. In an approach reminiscent of the bygone colonial era, it remains a policy set by governments thousands of miles away.

“The mosque is a gift from Qatar but it’s not free. I have always said that they will expect something in return, and this shows that they are making some claims for their money.” — Lars Aslan Rasmussen, Copenhagen city councilman.

Officials from nearly all of Denmark’s main political parties have expressed their support for the bill to ban foreign funding of mosques.

“It is a real problem if donations are made from organizations that want to undermine fundamental democratic values.” — Foreign Affairs Minister Mattias Tesfaye.