Stories related to: Kuwait

Exposure to chemicals and pesticides during the first Gulf War is the likely cause of widespread illnesses suffered by its veterans, a new study concludes. Some 250,000 veterans of the conflict—a third of the troops who served— suffer fatigue, muscle and joint pain, memory lapses, intestinal problems, and sleep disturbances, the San Diego Tribune reports. The umbrella of ailments is widely known as Gulf War syndrome, though federal authorities resist that label. More »

A US Army sniper was sentenced to 10 years in prison yesterday after a court martial found him guilty of murdering an Iraqi civilian. The Iraqi was shot when he stumbled upon the sniper's hideout, and a weapon was planted on the body to make it appear that the victim was a terrorist, reports the Los Angeles Times . More »

Soldiers who are unfit because of injuries or illness are being sent to Iraq to meet deployment goals. Physicians reveal that 52 soldiers from Colorado's Fort Carson were deployed despite suffering from nerve damage, mental health problems and other ailments, the Denver Post reports. "Because of issues reaching deployable strength we have been taking borderline soldiers who would otherwise have been left behind for treatment," said an email by a camp doctor. More »

President Bush wound up a Middle East tour yesterday leaving many pro-democracy activists in the region bitter and disappointed, reports the Washington Post . The president and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pressured authoritarian Arab governments for political reforms in 2005, but now activists worry that the White House is favoring the stability of autocratic Arab governments over the uncertainty of democratically elected ones. More »

The subprime collapse has US financial institutions in uncharted waters—asking for help from foreign investors and governments, the Wall Street Journal reports. Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, and Morgan Stanley all have recently sought bailouts, a dramatic switch from a tradition that saw US banks coming to the “rescue of nations and businesses across the world." More »

President Bush flew to Kuwait today, the first of five Arab nations he will visit to drum up support for an Israeli/Palestinian peace deal and to find ways to contain Iran. But don’t expect a “blinding flash” of support, given Israel’s pariah status, Condoleezza Rice warned. Bush is hoping he can convince Arab nations to throw muscle behind embattled Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in his struggle against Hamas, the AP reports. More »

Kuwait’s national oil company agreed to buy a 50% stake in Dow Chemical’s plastics divisions for $9.5 billion, marking the biggest overseas investment by a Kuwaiti firm, Bloomberg reports. CEO Andrew Liveris said Dow would benefit from cheap access to raw materials and liquid assets received from the deal, which Liveris said Dow planned to invest in specialty-chemical plastics assets. More »

The flagging greenback is forcing oil-rich Gulf states to consider uncoupling their currencies from the US dollar to fight runaway inflation at home and the devaluation of their own currencies, the Wall Street Journal reports. Leaders are considering everything from an outright break to revaluing their own currencies to pegging them to several currencies, including the dollar. More »

Calling it a "small and worthless piece of paper,” Iran’s president today urged OPEC's members to drop the depreciating US dollar as its official currency. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad blamed President Bush for the dollar’s decline and its adverse effects. The comments highlight mounting tension among OPEC members, the AP reports. More »

The Army is under fire for failing to train enough officers to supervise billions of dollars in contracts and allowing waste and fraud to flourish, reports the New York Times .  The problems have "created a crisis," according to an independent six-member panel appointed by Army Secretary Pete Geren and charged with investigating contracts to supply US troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. More »

The Pentagon is investigating widespread graft involving US war-zone contracts, with 29 soldiers and civilians charged so far, the New York Times reports. Most of the scrutiny focuses on a contracting office in Kuwait, where an Army major is charged with taking $10 million in bribes from companies seeking contracts in Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan. More »

An American company paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes to secure some $12 million in contracts in Iraq and Kuwait, despite poor performance on earlier work, according to court documents obtained by the New York Times . Lee Dynamics International was suspended from seeking government work after an Army officer admitted to taking $225,000 in bribes before killing herself last year. More »

Scores of investigations are under way into fraud, bribery and other criminal activity relating to billions of dollars worth of arms and other war materiel supplied to forces in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kuwait, the New York Times reports. The focus of the investigations range from the misappropriation of a few thousand dollars to multi-million-dollar bribery cases. More »