Free Republic

AMMAN: Iraqi former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi and his former defence minister are targets of an Iraqi government smear campaign inspired by neighbouring Iran, a senior Allawi aide said today. Ibrahim al-Janabi, deputy head of the National Accord Movement (Wifaq) headed by Allawi, said allegations against former defence minister Hazem Shaalan in connection with the disappearance of 1 billion dollars from his ministry were a fabrication designed to prevent secular leaders from returning to power. ''There are elements within the government that have strong ties with Iranian intelligence who seek to stir these issues,'' Janabi told Reuters in Amman. ''This...

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iraq's interim defense minister said on Friday the government would arrest Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmad Chalabi after the Eid al-Adha holiday for allegedly maligning the defense ministry. "We will arrest him and hand him over to Interpol. We will arrest him based on facts that he wanted to malign the reputation of the defense ministry and defense minister," Hazim al-Shaalan told Al Jazeera television, adding the measures would start after the Muslim holiday which began on Jan. 20.

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) -- Lebanon's finance minister on Sunday downplayed the Iraqi Defense Ministry's transfer of $500 million to a Beirut financial institution, saying he would expect such a transfer to be legal if it was made by the Iraqi government. In southern Iraq, the politician demanding a probe into Iraqi Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan's decision to make the cash transfer said he would not flee his country. Ahmad Chalabi said he was staying despite Shaalan's threat to arrest him and turn him over to Interpol based on an old Jordanian bank fraud conviction.Finance Minister Elias Saba told the private...

Here we go again. With the start of the Iraqi campaign season, doomsters are back with predictions of disaster for the newly liberated nation. Some claim the election could be a prelude to civil war. Others warn that the nation's Shiite majority might, in a moment of madness, choose an Iranian-style theocracy. Still others point to the Kurdish show of disaffection as a sign the multi-ethnic country may well be heading for disintegration, and that the coming elections could speed up the process. Yet most doomsters are the same people who opposed first the liberation of Iraq, and then the...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Militants said Wednesday they had kidnapped the brother-in-law of Iraqi Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan and demanded he end all military operations in the holy city of Najaf, according to a video, Al-Jazeera television reported. The authenticity of the video could not immediately be verified. The militants, calling themselves the "Divine Wrath Brigades," said they kidnapped Maj. Gen. Salah Hassan Lami, Shaalan's brother-in-law and the director of military affairs at the Defense Ministry, according to Al-Jazeera. A second man was also kidnapped, though it was unclear if he was related to Lami or Shaalan. The two men are...