Peyman Pejman

BAGHDAD – Mohammad Rabat is a farmer in his seventies. He lives with his wife and nine children in a single story cement house in what has come to be known as the Green Zone. The Green Zone, or the International Zone as it is also called, is a three square mile area in Baghdad … Continue reading “Baghdad Residents Want Their Neighborhood Back”

BAGHDAD – Saboteurs attacked an oil pipeline in southern Iraq over the weekend, sending up pillars of smoke and bringing a slowdown in supply. It was by no means an isolated incident. Another pipeline 150km (93 mi.) north of the southern port of Basra was attacked. Yet another was set ablaze in the desert region … Continue reading “Iraq’s Oil Is Still Flowing, Somehow”

NAJAF – Najaf was in the grip of eerie silence Tuesday despite the U.S. jets flying across clear skies and the sound of mortar blasts that shook the town. After three weeks of often pitched battles between armed followers of radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr on the one hand and a coalition of Iraqi and … Continue reading “People of Najaf Trapped in War They Don’t Want”

BAGHDAD – Seventeen months after the fall of Saddam Hussein, many Iraqi traders say the economy is stagnating. Last year in August the streets of Baghdad were bustling with commercial activity. At almost every corner sat a man exchanging money or selling something, usually an imported commodity. Shops were stacked ceiling high. Many were so … Continue reading “Violence Slows Iraqi Economy”

BAGHDAD – What a difference a few months can make. The last time I was in Baghdad was late November. The city, the whole country for that matter, acutely felt under occupation. There were signs of it everywhere. Flying from Amman to Baghdad by the Royal Jordanian, the only available commercial – meaning not military … Continue reading “Appearance and Reality in the New Baghdad”

BAGHDAD – More than 1,300 delegates from across Iraq gathered here Sunday to elect 100 members for the interim consultative assembly, but angry opponents disrupted the opening sessions and accused the government of undemocratic ways. Instead of debating topics on the agenda, much of the discussions turned into heated debates about fighting in Najaf, where … Continue reading “Iraq Assembly off to a Faltering Start”

DUBAI – The rumor mill has been hard at work since Saddam Hussein first appeared before an Iraqi investigative judge after his December capture. The questions, now, are who will defend the former Iraqi president and will he get a fair trail under the new government. At his arraignment on July 1, the former Iraqi … Continue reading “Quandary Over Saddam’s Defense”

DUBAI – A series of escalating spats in the Gulf waters between Iran, on one hand, and the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Oman, on the other, has cast a large shadow over relations between these countries. Officials from the three Gulf countries and many foreign diplomats are also perplexed over the recent hostile actions … Continue reading “A Brawl in the Persian Gulf”

A pair of suicide bombings in the Kurdish area of Iraq and repeated demonstrations by supporters of a revered Shiite leader throughout the country has raised two nagging questions in the minds of many in the war-torn nation. Is the threat of terrorism beyond control in Iraq, and have recent religious outpourings spelled the death … Continue reading “Increasing Violence Threatens Iraqi Secularism”

Although Iran is facing political turmoil inside the country, its relationship with Persian Gulf and Middle Eastern countries has never been better since clerics ended 2,500 years of monarchy in 1979. Whereas once countries in the region were fearful that Tehran might want to dominate the region and help topple Sunni-majority kingdoms and undemocratic rulers … Continue reading “Iran: Trouble Within, but Ties with Neighbors Never Better”