| Population: |
24.2 million (2002), 53.6 million (2050)
|
| Ethnic group: |
Arabs, Kurds, Turkic and Aramaic.
|
| Religion: |
Predominantly Islam with Sh'ite Muslims
forming a slight majority over the Sunnis who have traditionally ruled
the country.
|
| Climate: |
Hot, dry summers and cold winters,
especially in the mountains.
|
| Currency: |
Iraqi Dinar.
|
| Time zone: |
GMT +3.
|
| Public holidays: |
2003: Jan 1, 6, Feb 8, 12*, March 5*, 14*,
May 14*, July 14, 17, Aug 8, Sep 24*, Nov 26*.
|
| Electricity |
220V. UK-style square pin mainly, but also
large round 3-pins for major appliances, some round Euro-style two-pins.
|
| Travel rules: |
Passport, visa required.
|
| Driving |
Right-hand drive. International driving
licence also valid.
|
| Health rules: |
Malaria prophylaxis recommended. All
passengers between 12 and 65 years arriving for a stay of more than 5
days must report at al-Kindi, Al-Kerama or al- Kadhimiya hospital in
Baghdad or one of the centres for preventive medicine outside Baghdad
for a medical examination on aids and a number of diseases like
syphilis, organic diseases, tuberculoses, leprosy, malaria, Belharzia
and cholera.
|
| Source: Sources: State of the World
Population 2002, UNFPA; Europa World Year Book 2001 |
POLITICAL PROFILE
| Known to the ancient world as Mesopotamia,
Iraq formed part of the Ottoman Empire until World War One, when the
territory came under British rule. Emir Faisal Ibn Hussain, a member of
the Hashemite dynasty of Arabia, became king in 1921 and the country
gained full independence from Britain in 1932.
A military coup toppled the monarchy in 1958, and set off a period of
political instability. The leftwing nationalist regime of Brigadier
Abdul Karim Qassim took over, ending Iraq's pro-Western stance.
A second coup by the military's pan-Arab forces ousted Qassim five years
later, and the new leaders developed closer ties with Egypt. Martial law
was lifted and a civilian government inaugurated in 1965.
The Sunni-dominated Baath party's coup in 1968 brought General Ahmed
Hassan al-Bakr to the presidency at the head of the newly-formed
Revolutionary Command Council. Persecution of political opponents became
widespread.
Saddam Hussein served as al-Bakr's vice-president for 10 years before
taking over as president in 1979.
Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution sent ripples of fear across the Gulf
region, with Iraq particularly vulnerable because of its large Shi'ite
population. The revolution dealt a heavy blow to the strength and
discipline of the Iranian army and Iraq, determined to fight off the
threat of Islamic fundamentalism from Tehran, invaded Iran in 1980, to
lay claim to the Shatt al-Arab waterway.
The invasion started the Gulf War which became the Middle East's longest
and bloodiest armed conflict in modern times. Iraq was supplied with
arms from the former Soviet Union and funds by other Gulf states which
feared Iran's dominance and its brand of radical Islam. The war cost an
estimated one million lives before a United Nations-sponsored cease-fire
took effect in August 1988. Iraq drew international condemnation after
allegations it killed thousands of civilians by dropping chemical bombs
on the Kurdish town of Halabja a day after it had been seized by Iran.
In July 1990, Iraq turned its attention on its tiny neighbour Kuwait,
accusing it of stealing Iraqi oil and demanding compensation. Iraq sent
thousands of troops and tanks to the border and on August 2, invaded
Kuwait, overwhelmed its army and installed a government.
The United States responded by dispatching thousands of its own troops,
aircraft and warships to the Gulf to protect Saudi Arabia and to enforce
U.N. economic sanctions against Iraq and occupied Kuwait. As Iraq made
peace with Iran, to free thousands more troops from its Iranian border,
other Western and Arab countries joined the United States in what became
one of the biggest concentrations of firepower since World War Two.
Diplomatic efforts to achieve a peaceful solution to the crisis failed,
and on November 20, 1990, the U.N. Security Council adopted a U.S. draft
resolution authorising the use of force to implement the council's
Resolution 660, demanding Iraq's immediate and unconditional withdrawal
from Kuwait.
"Operation Desert Storm" to free Kuwait commenced on the
nights of January 16 and 17, 1991, with air raids on Baghdad. During the
nights of February 23 and 24, the multi-national force entered Kuwait
and defeated the Iraqis. On March 3 Iraq accepted the cease-fire terms,
which created a demilitarised zone between Iraq and Kuwait, monitored by
military personnel from the five permanent members of the U.N. Security
Council.
Between 150,000 and 200,000 people, mostly civilians, died in the war.
Following the allied victory in Kuwait, rebellion broke out in the
Kurdish north and Shi'ite south. Although the revolt was quickly
suppressed, Iraqi attacks on Kurdish civilians led Western governments
to set up a security zone and a U.N. safe haven in northern Iraq to
protect them. An air exclusion zone north of the 36th parallel was also
established.
Saddam Hussein withdrew his administration from Kurdish northern Iraq in
October 1991, enabling the Kurds to establish a de facto administration
with its capital at Arbil and control over an area with a population of
3.5 million. In 1992, the Kurds elected a 100-seat parliament and a
"political leader".
A Kurdish government was formed with the two party leaders of the
Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK)
jointly in control. Trading difficulties, fuel and food shortages, along
with land disputes, led to fighting between the two parties for most of
1994 and 1995, leaving 3,000 dead and the administration defunct.
Although the Shi'ite revolt in southern Iraq was defeated in April 1991,
a low-level insurgency continued in the southern marshlands. Continued
Iraqi bombing of Shi'ite refugees in these areas led to an air exclusion
zone being established south of the 32nd parallel in August 1992,
patrolled by U.S., British and French aircraft. Since then, the
government of Baghdad systematically drained the southern marshes by
canal construction and river diversion; with continued ground
offensives, effectively ending the Shi'ite rebellion by late 1994.
Following his defeat in Kuwait, Saddam Hussein strengthened his control
over Iraq. He also sought to bolster his domestic popularity through
continued confrontation with U.N. inspectors sent to Iraq to monitor the
elimination of the country's weapons of mass destruction.
In May 1994, facing a deepening economic crisis, Saddam assumed the post
of Prime Minister, and in January 1995, undertook a comprehensive
reorganisation of military ranks, apparently as the result of an
unsuccessful attempt to stage a military coup that same month. A
referendum in October 1995 overwhelmingly approved a constitutional
amendment on a further seven-year term for the president.
In May 1996, Iraq finally agreed to U.N. terms to sell oil worth $2
billion every six months, to pay for urgent humanitarian needs of the
Iraqi people, suffering from the effects of the economic sanctions and
massive destruction of the country's infrastructure and services during
the war. The oil-for-food deal was later renewed by the United Nations,
and humanitarian organisations said that it improved living conditions
for many Iraqis..
The U.N. Children's Fund (UNICEF) said in an August 2000 report that
children under five in the heavily populated southern and central areas
controlled by the Baghdad government were dying at more than twice the
rate of ten years previously.
When George W. Bush was elected U.S. president in November 2000, some
analysts suggested it could have implications for sanctions against
Iraq.
A U.N. report in early October 2001 accused Iraq of spending too little
of the money it is allowed under the oil-for-food deal, and of leaving
women-headed households in a vulnerable position without specific
provisions for their needs. The Iraqi trade ministry denied the charge.
After suicide attacks on Washington and New York on September 11, 2001
that killed around 3,000 people, senior U.S. officials and legislators
advocated attacking Iraq as part of the "war on terrorism".
In early August 2002, Iraq invited the U.S. Congress to send a mission
to Baghdad and said it would be given free access to any sites suspected
of developing weapons of mass destruction. The weapons inspectors
returned in November backed by a U.N. resolution threatening serious
consequences if Iraq was found to be in "material breach" of
its terms.
U.S. and British diplomats tried to rally U.N. backing for strikes
against Iraq, but withdrew their resolution when it became clear that
France would veto it and other countries were also opposed.
On March 20, 2003, U.S. and British forces launched attacks on Iraq.
|
| Source: Sources: BBC World Service and
Reuters |
HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDICATORS
| Infant mortality: |
78.5 per 1,000 live births.
|
| Maternal mortality: |
310 per 100,000 live births.
|
| Life expectancy: |
62.3 years male, 65.3 years female.
|
| Illiteracy: |
34.1 percent male, 56.8 percent female above
15 years.
|
| Access to basic care: |
98 percent.
|
| Access to safe water: |
85 percent.
|
| Human development index value: |
0.583 (1998)
|
| Source: Sources: UNDP Human Development
Report 2000, UNFPA State of the World Population Report 2002 |
ECONOMIC INDICATORS
| GDP: |
Estimated $15.0 billion (2001)
|
| Growth: |
Estimated 15 percent (2000)
|
| Inflation: |
Estimated 100 percent (2000)
|
| Debt: |
Estimated $139 billion (2000)
|
| Defence expenditure: |
Estimated $1.4 billion (2000)
|
| Source: Source: Military Balance
2002/2003, IISS |
MILITARY STATISTICS
| Armed forces: |
Active E 389,000 men, E 650,000 reserves.
|
| Army: |
E 350,000 men, including E 100,000 recalled
reserves, with perhaps 2,600 main battle tanks.
|
| Navy: |
E 2,000 men, with one frigate, five patrol
and coastal vessels and three minesweepers.
|
| Air force: |
E20,000 men, with about six bombers and
about E 316 fighter aircraft.
AIR DEFENCE COMMAND: E17,000
|
| Opposition rebels: |
Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP): E15,000.
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK): E10,000 Supremme Council for Islamic
Resistance in Iraq (SCIRI): E 4,000-8,000
|
| Source: Source: Military Balance
2002/2003, IISS |
COMMUNICATIONS
| Civil aviation: |
There are international airports near
Baghdad, at Bamerni and at Basra. A new airport, Saddam International,
is under construction at Baghdad. Civilian and military airports
sustained heavy damage during the Gulf War in 1991. Basra airport
reopened in May 1991.
Civilian airports are not operational but are open only to the United
Nations mission. The distance from the city centre to Baghdad
International Airport is about 30 kms. The airport in Amman, in Jordan,
is about 850 km from Baghdad. The drive across the desert takes about 10
hours, including one or two hours at the Iraqi-Jordanian border.
Airlines of Jordan, Egypt, yemen, United Arab Emirates and Russia
could resume scheduled flights to Baghdad in 2001, banned under
sanctions since the 1991 war.
Iraqi Airways Co, formly Iraqi Airways, operated international and
domestic scheduled passenger and cargo services from Baghdad before the
war. Attempts were made to restart internal flights in May 1991 and
permission was granted by the United Nations for the operation of
helicopters on limited domestic flights. Fixed-wing flights were banned
under the cease-fire terms. The U.N. Security Council agreed to the
resumption of internal flights which started in January 1992 from
Baghdad to Basra, using its Antonov An-24s. Operations were suspended
shortly after.
Iraq maintains U.N. resolutions do not bar Iraq from using its
civilian planes for both domestic and international flights. The
assertion by the Iraqi Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Riyadh al-Qeisi
to the official Iraqi News Agency on May 14, 1997, followed the
government's action in transporting 104 Moslem pilgrims, all over
50-years-old, to Saudi Arabia to perform the 1997 annual Moslem
pilgrimage to Mecca. The pilgrims flew in a Soviet-built Ilyushin 76
which took off from Rasheed airbase in the eastern outskirts of the
Iraqi capital on April 9 in defiance of U.N. sanctions barring
international flights by Iraqi aircraft. The U.N. Security Council had
earlier rejected Iraq's request to use its civil aircraft to fly
pilgrims to Mecca and for the release of its frozen assets abroad for
haj (pilgrimage) purposes. Iraq dispersed its fleet of 15 Boeing
airliners to foreign airports to protect them against possible attack
shortly before the 1991 Gulf War. Six of the Boeings are said to be in
Jordan, four in Tunisia and five in Iran. Qeisi said the United States
and Britain had rejected Iraq's demand to bring the planes back to Iraq
to use them for domestic and international flights.Tunisia and five in
Iran. Qeisi said the United States and Britain had rejected Iraq's
demand to bring the planes back to Iraq to use them for domestic and
international flights.
|
| Railways: |
The metre-gauge line runs frm Baghdad,
through Khanaqin and Kirkuk, to Arbil. The standard gauge line covers
the length of the country, from Rabia, on the Syrian border, via Mosul,
to Baghdad (534 km), and from Baghdad to Basra and Umm Qasr (608 km), on
the Gulf. A 404-km standard-gauge line links Baghdad to Husaibah, near
the Iraqi-Syrian frontier, a 638-km line runs from Baghdad, via al-Qaim
(on the Syrian border) to Akashat and a 252-km line links Kirkuk to
Haditha via Baiji. There is a regular international service between
Baghdad and Istanbul. A rapid transit transport system is being
undertaken in Baghdad.
|
| Roads: |
At the end of 1996, there were 47.400 km of
roads, of which 40,760 were paved. Most sections of the six-lane
1,264-km international Express Highway, linking Safwan (on the Kuwaiti
border) with the Jordanian an Syrian borders, had been completed by June
1990. The Diwaniya-Nasiriya section was expected to be completed in
1993. An elaborate network of roads was constructed behind the war front
with Iran in order to facilitate the movement of troops and supplies
during the 1980-88 conflict.
|
| Source: Source: Europa World Year Book
2001 |
|
