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  • Saudi PIF allocates $3bn for investments in Iraq, says ambassador

    Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) has allocated $3 billion for investments in various sectors in Iraq, the country’s envoy in Baghdad said on Wednesday. Saudi Ambassador to Iraq Abdulaziz Al-Shammari's remarks to the Iraqi state media INA came on the sidelines of a signing ceremony of a partnership agreement in the industrial field.

  • US kills 5 Iran-backed militia members in drone strike in Iraq

    US forces killed at least five Iran-backed militia members in a drone strike after the US “identified an imminent attack” was likely to be launched by militia forces in Kirkuk, Iraq, on Sunday, a US official said. It wasn’t immediately clear which group the forces killed on Sunday belonged to. The number of attacks by Iran-backed proxy groups on US and coalition forces in Iraq and Syria has risen to 76 since October 17, a defense official told CNN.

  • Climate change: Intensity of ongoing drought in Syria, Iraq and Iran ‘not rare anymore’

    Large parts of Iraq, Iran and Syria have been gripped by an intense drought for years. Low rainfall and high temperatures have caused crops to fail and driven water shortages across the region, pushing millions of people into food insecurity. The study finds that, between July 2020 and June 2023, climate change made the drought more intense – mainly due to high temperatures that dried out the soil. In a world without climate change, the dry period would not have even been severe enough to be called a drought, the study notes. The authors find that climate change also made the event more likely.

  • Saudi football ‘charm offensive’ arrives in Iraq

    In front of a raucous crowd in Erbil, underdog Iraqi club Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya has soundly defeated visiting Saudi side Al-Ittihad. The Nov. 6 game, an Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Champions League clash, was held at Franso Hariri Stadium in the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan. “The game and the atmosphere are beautiful,” Ali Al-Amir, a 21-year-old from Baghdad’s Karrada neighborhood, told Amwaj.media. Both Iraqi and Kurdish flags were in abundance around the crowd, along with Jawiya’s blue banners. Vendors worked the stands selling cups of pomegranate seeds and datil, Iraq’s version of the churro.

  • Rockets, drones hit Iraqi bases housing U.S. forces

    The United States has 2,500 troops in Iraq, and 900 more in neighbouring Syria, on a mission to advise and assist local forces in combating Islamic State, which in 2014 seized swathes of territory in both countries.

    Ain al-Asad air base is located in the western Anbar province.

  • Saudi Arabia inaugurates GCC electricity market connection with Iraq worth $300m

    Saudi Arabia has inaugurated the Gulf electricity market project's connection platform with Iraq, and the electricity exchanged with the neighbouring country could contribute to energy sales volumes reaching up to $300 million annually. The plan is to expand the initiative to other countries, Prince Saud bin Nayef, the governor of Saudi Arabia's eastern province, said during the platform's inauguration at the GCC Interconnection Authority's headquarters in Al Dammam city. “This platform creates opportunities for the Gulf market to facilitate the exchange and trade of electric power among the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council and the Republic of Iraq,” Yaqoob Saif Al Kiyumi, vice chairman of GCCIA, said in a statement on Wednesday.

  • Deep Dive: Armed groups in Iraq, Yemen warn US of multi-front response to Gaza war

    hiite armed groups in Iraq are threatening to target American assets in the region if the US intervenes in the Hamas-Israel war—or if Tel Aviv “expands the battleground.” This comes amid reports of a possible Israeli ground incursion into Gaza, and as Israel may also target Lebanon, where several cross-border confrontations with Hezbollah have taken place. Meanwhile, Yemen’s Ansarullah movement—better known as the Houthis—has stated that it will respond if the US intervenes in Gaza.

  • Iraq wedding fire kills more than 100, relatives identify bodies

    A fire ripped through a packed wedding hall in northern Iraq late on Tuesday, killing more than 100 people in a Christian town that had survived Islamic State occupation. Fire fighters searched the charred remains of the building in Qaraqosh, also known as Hamdaniya, through Wednesday morning and bereaved relatives gathered outside a morgue in the nearby city of Mosul, wailing and rocking in distress.

  • The shifting ties between Iraq’s Shiites and the US

    The US relationship with Iraqi Shiite political actors prior to the 2003 invasion is often described as positive given the high-level consultations and coordination. This has led to the notion among some observers that Washington handed the country over to Iraqi Shiites and to Iran. But this belief is far from shared by Shiites, who recall waves of tension both before and after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Today, Iraq's Shiites and the US face challenges marked by three key dimensions: ties with Iran, the lack of a unified Shiite vision for relations with the US, and the absence of strong instruments to build an effective relationship.

  • Plans for historic GCC-Iran-Iraq dinner in New York collapse

    The Sept. 23 session was initially envisioned as a lunch, informed sources told Amwaj.media, but was later confirmed as a dinner. Formal invitations were sent out to all eight participants earlier this month. A regional diplomatic source said the session was to be convened under UN Security Council Resolution 598, which calls for the establishment of Regional Dialogue Fora, with Secretary-General Guterres as chair.