Search

The United Nations' oil-for-food program was so badly managed and supervised that more than half of the 4,500 companies doing business with Iraq paid illegal surcharges and kickbacks to Saddam Hussein, finds an independent investigation into the program.

The new rules mandate background checks and permission from the military before a contractor can carry a weapon, and they spell out conditions for medical care and evacuation. At least 524 U.S. military contract workers, many of them Iraqis, have been killed in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion.

The chief Pentagon agency charged with investigating and reporting fraud and waste in Iraq quietly pulled out of the war zone a year ago -- leaving what experts say are gaps in the oversight of how more than $140 billion is being spent.

MARRAKECH -- The lack of transparency and public participation in the climate negotiations will further worsen conditions for Indigenous Peoples, people of color and workers in the US and US-Mexico border. Speakers from Indigenous Environmental Network, Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice, CorpWatch and Redefining Progress held a briefing on Tuesday in Marrakech, bringing issues of racial justice and worker's rights to the center of the climate change negotiations.

In a widening scandal at the United States Special Operations Command, federal investigators are looking into a bribery scheme as well as accusations of improper influence involving millions of dollars in battlefield equipment used by Navy Seals and Army Green Berets and Rangers.

Once thought of as little better than mercenaries, Britain's private-security firms are now seen by many as valued and legitimate businesses.

The assessment marks the first time a sitting inspector general -- in this case a former White House deputy assistant to President George W. Bush -- has formally criticized the prewar planning process. Most of the authoritative criticism to date has come from retired military or diplomatic officers or academics who worked in the reconstruction effort.

Jim Bernhard's athletic frame is slightly hunched as he tries to ignore a backache that has cropped up at the worst possible time. "This company was created for this moment. To restore the state I love," he says.

It is barely a week after Hurricane Katrina struck the Louisiana and Mississippi coasts and Mr Bernhard sits indistinguishable from the rest of his employees at a small table in the cafeteria of the Shaw Group, the Louisiana engineering and construction company he founded 18 years ago.

A private contracting firm flying in Afghanistan for the U.S. military was in violation of numerous government regulations and contract requirements when one of its planes crashed into a mountainside in November 2004, killing all six on board, according to an Army report made public yesterday.

U.S.-hired contractors rely on laborers from impoverished countries, but no one looks out for the rights -- or lives -- of the foreigners.

Thousands of workers are needed to meet the demands of the unprecedented privatization of military support operations unfolding under the watch of the U.S. Army and KBR, its prime contractor in Iraq. KBR, in turn, KBR, outsources much of the work to lowly-paid workers imported from developing nations.

Robert Hill became concerned about the "mistreatment" of third-country nationals working in Iraq and then chose to walk away from his one-year commitment, saying he felt that speaking out made him a target for repercussions from his superiors.

Lobbyists representing transportation, energy and other special interests dominated panels that advised Louisiana's U.S. senators crafting legislation to rebuild the storm-damaged Gulf Coast, records and interviews show.

The United States has long condemned the practices that are now part of the privatization of the American war effort and which is central to the operations of Halliburton subsidiary KBR, the U.S. military's biggest private contractor in Iraq.

Top officials who managed U.S. reconstruction projects in Iraq have been hired by some of the same big companies that received those contracts and which are now involved in a rush of deals to rebuild after Hurricane Katrina.

Thousands of low-wage Asian laborers are traveling to Iraq to work for U.S. military contractors like First Kuwaiti and Prime Projects International in the hope of sending money home to their families. Trapped and exploited under inhuman conditions, many of them are now fleeing the country to save their lives.

Across the hurricane ravaged Gulf Coast, thousands upon thousands of blue tarps are being nailed to wind-damaged roofs, a visible sign of government assistance.
Construction crews working with TJC Defense, out of Alabama, install a blue tarp on a home in Kenner, Louisiana. Ian McVea, Fort Worth Star-Telegram
The blue sheeting - a godsend to residents whose homes are threatened by rain - is rapidly becoming the largest roofing project in the nation's history.

It isn't coming cheap.