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Wednesday, July 30th 2008, 12:28 AM July 30 - Iraq's daily oil production is at its highest level since the March 2003 U.S. invasion, in large part thanks to improved security, a new U.S. audit says. A $34 million security system of ditches, berms, fences and concertina wire - all guarded by Iraqi forces - has stopped attacks since July 2007 on the pipeline running from Kirkuk in the north to a major refinery in Baiji, in central Iraq, Stuart Bowen, the Defense Department's inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, said. In the past 12 months, 'there have been no reported interdictions - resulting in the substantial rise in northern crude oil exports', Bowen said in his 18th quarterly report to Congress on the expenditure of $50 billion in U.S. economic aid. The report is his third this year to outline increasing improvements to Iraq's security and economy. 'Iraq's burgeoning oil windfall, which has yielded more than $33 billion in revenues to date in 2008', may result in another unanticipated $7 billion that could be spent on reconstruction as U.S. spending winds down, Bowen said. 'Iraqi oil production set new records this quarter, with output reaching 2.43 million barrels per day, the highest quarterly average since the invasion', Bowen wrote. Oil analysts say Iraq has the world's third-largest reservoir of untapped crude oil.
[...] Since the March 2003 invasion, 4,117 U.S. troops have died in combat in Iraq, according to Pentagon figures. Oil Production Iraq's increased production between July 2007 and May was especially noticeable in the north where exports increased by about 91.3 million barrels, or about $8.215 billion, Bowen said.
(continues at):
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2008/0
7/29/2008-07-29_iraqs_oil_output_is_highest_since_invas
i-2.html
Despite international outcry (including the UN General Assembly's resolution in 2004 that demanded Israel to tear down the wall segregating Israelis from Arabs), the 150-kilometre barrier remains a testimony to Israel's tenacious defiance to International Law. According to Israeli statistics, nineteen illegal Jewish settlements exist in the Jordan River Valley, all of them located between the Palestinian towns of Jericho and Jiftliq.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, when asked about the plan in a television interview, confirmed its existence but gave no details about exactly when or where it would be built. “At the moment, we are planning the route and when it is ready, it will be brought before the government (for approval),” Sharon said.
The already built segregation wall has encircled tens of thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank with electronic fences and concrete walls. Thousands of dunums of the West Bnak’c most fertile land has already been encroached upon.
“This fence allows Sharon to realize his dreams, to divide up the Palestinian population into small groups, a canonization,” said Dror Etkes of the Israeli group Peace Now.
The 'security wall' means that food from the Jordan Valley into the West Bank, which would mean annexing the main food basket for Palestinians.
