 | Mexico’s Other Crisis: Foreign Banks by Kent Paterson, Special to CorpWatch May 15th, 2009 The worldwide financial crisis is hitting people in the Global South with particular venom, and disaster profiteering is alive and well. Take Mexico. While entities like Citigroup-owned Banamex get away with charging Mexican credit account-holders usurious interest rates of up to 100 percent, Banamex itself turned nearly $1 billion in profits in 2008. |
 | Policing Afghanistan: Obama's New Strategy by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch March 23rd, 2009 A new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan will be unveiled by President Barack Obama this week. It plans to ramp up the training of the Afghan army and police at a cost of some $2 billion a year. Private contractor DynCorp is already lining up to bid for some of the lucrative contracts. This article provides an overview of key reports assessing the training of the Afghan police, and DynCorp's role, to date. |
 | GEO Group, Inc.: Despite a Crashing Economy, Private Prison Firm Turns a Handsome Profit by Erin Rosa, Special to CorpWatch March 1st, 2009 While the nation’s economy flounders, business is booming for The GEO Group Inc., a private prison firm paid millions by the U.S. government. Behind the financial success and expansion of the for-profit security company, there are increasing charges of negligence, civil rights violations, abuse and even death. |
 | Inheriting Halliburton's Army: What Will Obama Do With KBR? by Pratap Chatterjee, TomDispatch.com February 22nd, 2009 President Obama will almost certainly touch down in Baghdad and Kabul in Air Force One sometime in the coming year to meet his counterparts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he will just as certainly pay a visit to a U.S. military base or two. Should he stay to eat with the troops, he will no less certainly choose from a menu prepared by migrant Asian workers under contract to Houston-based KBR, the former subsidiary of Halliburton. |
 | Book Release: "Halliburton's Army: How A Well-Connected Texas Oil Company Revolutionized The Way America Makes War"
by Pratap Chatterjee, Nation Books February 3rd, 2009 In "HALLIBURTON’S ARMY: How a Well-Connected Texas Oil Company Revolutionized the Way America Makes War" (Nation Books; February 9, 2009; $26.95), muckraking journalist Pratap Chatterjee conducts a highly detailed investigation into Halliburton and its former subsidiary KBR’s activities in Kuwait and Iraq, uncovering much new information about its questionable practices and extraordinary profits. |
 | Outsourcing Intelligence in Iraq:
A CorpWatch Report on L-3/Titan, Updated December 2008 with Recommendations from Amnesty International
by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch December 9th, 2008 When U.S. troops or embassy officials want to investigate Iraqis - such as interrogating prisoners, the principal intermediary is a Manhattan based-company named L-3. CorpWatch is pleased to release an updated version of this report, with recommendations from Amnesty International on human rights and other standards for translation and intelligence contracting. |
 | One Million Weapons to Iraq; Many Go Missing by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch September 22nd, 2008 An Alabama company controlled by a billionaire Kuwaiti family is the biggest supplier of guns to Iraq. These weapons were paid for by the Pentagon which has lost track of them. A new Amnesty international report says that such unrestrained global arms trading schemes may have catastrophic human rights consequences. |
 | Carlyle Group May Buy Major CIA Contractor: Booz Allen Hamilton by Tim Shorrock , Special to CorpWatch March 8th, 2008 The Carlyle Group, one of the world's largest private equity funds, may soon buy out the $2 billion dollar intelligence division of Booz Allen Hamilton, one of the biggest advisors to the U.S. spy community. |
 | QinetiQ Goes Kinetic: Top Rumsfeld Aide Wins Contracts From Spy Office He Set Up by Tim Shorrock , Special to CorpWatch January 15th, 2008 A Pentagon office that was reprimanded by the U.S. Congress for spying on antiwar activists, has just awarded a multi-million dollar contract to QinetiQ, a British company that employs Stephen Cambone. Cambone, a former aide to Donald Rumsfeld, helped create the very office that issued the contract. |
 | The Gunmen of Kabul by Fariba Nawa, Special to CorpWatch December 21st, 2007 The booming private security industry in Afghanistan has been the target of a number government raids in the last few months. One of the largest contractors -- United States Protection and Investigations (USPI) from Texas -- has been accused of corruption. |
 | Climate Change Debate Fuels Greenwash Boom by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch December 11th, 2007 On the Indonesian island of Bali, thousands of senior government officials are negotiating a plan to slow global warming. The coal, gas and oil companies that are major producers of greenhouse gases are finally taking notice of these high-level political discussions, and many have mounted spirited public relations exercises to defend themselves. |
 | Domestic Spying, Inc. by Tim Shorrock , Special to CorpWatch November 27th, 2007 A new U.S. intelligence institution will allow government spy agencies to conduct broad surveillance and reconnaissance inside the country for the first time. Contractors like Boeing, BAE Systems, Harris Corporation, L-3 Communications and Science Applications International Corporation are already lining up for possible work. |
 | The Boys from Baghdad: Iraqi Commandos Trained by U.S. Contractor by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch September 20th, 2007 Iraqi commandos are being training by USIS, a Virginia-based company that was once owned by the Carlyle Group. One of multiple "security" forces being created with $20 billion in U.S. funds, these Emergency Response Units may be stoking civil unrest as they accompany U.S. troops on raids. |
 | Casualties of Katrina: Gulf Coast Reconstruction Two Years after the Hurricane by Eliza Strickland and Azibuike Akaba, Special to CorpWatch August 27th, 2007 This CorpWatch report, by Eliza Strickland and Azibuike Akaba, tells the story of corporate malfeasance and government incompetence two years after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans. This is our second report – Big, Easy Money by Rita J. King was the first – and it digs into a slew of new scandals. |
 | Goodbye Houston: An Alternative Annual Report on Halliburton
May 15th, 2007 CorpWatch and its partners today released an alternative annual report on Halliburton titled: "Goodbye Houston" The new report was prepared in association with Halliburton Watch and the Oil & Gas Accountability Project. |
 | Mystery of the Missing Meters:
Accounting for Iraq's Oil Revenue by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch March 22nd, 2007 How much crude oil is Iraq actually exporting? Nobody really knows how much is potentially being stolen by corrupt officials because the contractors in charge of fixing the meters have yet to calibrate them, four years after the invasion. |
 | This Alien Life: Privatized Prisons for Immigrants by Deepa Fernandes, Special to CorpWatch February 5th, 2007 In the wake of the September 11th attacks, the U.S. government invoked national security to sweep up and jail an unprecedented number of immigrants. Companies like Corrections Corporation of America and Wackenhut, have reaped the benefits. |
 | High-Tech Healthcare in Iraq, Minus the Healthcare by Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch January 8th, 2007 Almost four years after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s healthcare system is still a shambles. While most hospitals lack basic supplies, dozens of incomplete clinics and warehoused high-technology equipment remain as a testament to the failed U.S. experiment to reconstruct of Iraq. First in a series of CorpWatch articles. |
 | A U.S. Fortress Rises in Baghdad:
Asian Workers Trafficked to Build World's Largest Embassy
by David Phinney, Special to CorpWatch October 17th, 2006 Workers accuse the Kuwait contractor building the US embassy in Baghdad of smuggling low-paid South Asians into Iraq and labor trafficking. Still, the US State Department casts a blind eye on the complaints as it rushes to complete its most ambitious project ever. |
 | Afghanistan, Inc.: A CorpWatch Investigative Report October 6th, 2006 This weekend marks the fifth anniversary of the US invasion of Afghanistan. Fariba Nawa, an Afghan-American who returned to her native country to examine the progress of reconstruction, uncovers some examples of where the money has (and hasn’t) gone, how the system of international aid works (and doesn’t), and what it is really like in the villages and cities where outsiders are rebuilding the war-torn countryside. Click here to download the complete report. An HTML text version of the report is also available. Listen, watch or read an interview with Fariba Nawa on Democracy Now! about reconstruction, security, and life in Afghanistan five years after the invasion. |