Gang-Rape Cover-Up by U.S., Halliburton/KBR

December 10, 2007
Gang-Rape Cover-Up by U.S., Halliburton/KBR

A Houston, Texas woman says she was gang-raped by Halliburton/KBR coworkers in Baghdad, and the company and the U.S. government are covering up the incident.

Jamie Leigh Jones, now 22, says that after she was raped by multiple men at a KBR camp in the Green Zone, the company put her under guard in a shipping container with a bed and warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job.

"Don't plan on working back in Iraq. There won't be a position here, and there won't be a position in Houston," Jones says she was told.

Justice Department Probes US Emabassy price Cost

November 17, 2007
Justice Department Probes US Emabassy price Cost

The Justice Department is investigating whether laws were broken during the contracting and constructing of the massive Baghdad embassy complex, the Washington Post reports today.

Despite serious questions about the State Department's choice of contractors, the quality of the work performed and the conditions faced by some of the workers, the State Department's inspector general, Howard "Cookie" Krongard, has allowed only one inquiry into the project, which he handled personally.

Immunity deal hampers Blackwater inquiry

October 29, 2007
Immunity deal hampers Blackwater inquiry

WASHINGTON - The State Department promised Blackwater USA bodyguards immunity from prosecution in its investigation of last month's deadly shooting of 17 Iraqi civilians, The Associated Press has learned.

As a result, it will likely be months before the United States can — if ever — bring criminal charges in the case that has infuriated the Iraqi government.

"Once you give immunity, you can't take it away," said a senior law enforcement official familiar with the investigation.

State Department pays private contractors $4 billion a year

October 24, 2007

State Department pays private contractors $4 billion a year

WASHINGTON, Oct. 19 — Over the past four years, the amount of money the State Department pays to private security and law enforcement contractors has soared to nearly $4 billion a year from $1 billion, administration officials said Tuesday, but they said that the department had added few new officials to oversee the contracts.

It was the first time that the administration had outlined the ballooning scope of the contracts, and it provided a new indication of how the State Department´s efforts to monitor private companies had not kept pace. Auditors and outside exerts say the results have been vast cost overruns, poor contract performance and, in some cases, violence that has so far gone unpunished.

Reports Assail State Department on Iraq Security

October 23, 2007

Reports Assail State Department on Iraq Security

WASHINGTON, Oct. 22 — A pair of new reports have delivered scorching judgments about the State Department's performance in overseeing work done by the private companies that the government relies on increasingly in Iraq and Afghanistan to carry out delicate security work and other missions.

A State Department review of its own security practices in Iraq assails the department for poor coordination, communication, oversight and accountability involving armed security companies like Blackwater USA, according to people who have been briefed on the report. In addition to Blackwater, the State Department's two other security contractors in Iraq are DynCorp International and Triple Canopy.

State Dept. blocks Blackwater probe

September 26, 2007
State Dept. blocks Blackwater probe

WASHINGTON -- The State Department has interceded in a congressional investigation of Blackwater USA, the private security firm accused of killing Iraqi civilians last week, ordering the company not to disclose information about its Iraq operations without approval from the Bush administration, according to documents revealed Tuesday.

In a letter sent to a senior Blackwater executive Thursday, a State Department contracting official ordered the company "to make no disclosure of the documents or information" about its work in Iraq without permission.

Lawmaker says Rice interfered with Iraq inquiry

September 25, 2007
Lawmaker says Rice interfered with Iraq inquiry

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A leading Democratic lawmaker on Tuesday accused Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice of interfering in congressional inquiries into corruption in Iraq's government and the activities of U.S. security firm Blackwater.

Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman said State Department officials had told the Oversight and Government Reform Committee he chairs they could not provide details of corruption in Iraq's government unless the information was treated as a "state secret" and not revealed to the public.

Employees Want Accused State Auditor Out

September 19, 2007
Employees Want Accused State Auditor Out

WASHINGTON (AP) — The labor union representing U.S. diplomats called Wednesday for the State Department's top auditor to step down pending the results of a congressional investigation into whether he blocked fraud probes in Afghanistan and Iraq for political reasons.

At the same time, the State Department defended the accused official, Inspector General Howard J. Krongard, saying it had no evidence that would back up the allegations.

State Department's inspector general repeatedly thwarted investigations into fraud

September 19, 2007
State Department's inspector general repeatedly thwarted investigations into fraud

Howard J. Krongard, the State Department's inspector general, has repeatedly thwarted investigations into contracting fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan, including construction of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, and censored reports that might prove politically embarrassing to the Bush administration, the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform charged yesterday in a 13-page letter.

The letter, addressed to Krongard and signed by the committee chairman, Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.), who released it yesterday, said the allegations were based on the testimony of seven current and former officials on Krongard's staff, including two former senior officials who allowed their names to be used, and private e-mail exchanges obtained by the committee. The letter said the allegations concerned all three major divisions of Krongard's office -- investigations, audits and inspections.

State Dept. official facing charges for sending anti-Arab messages is indictede

August 20, 2007
State Dept. official facing charges for sending anti-Arab messages is indictede

A State Department diplomat charged this week for sending anti-Arab messages will retire later this month, a department spokeswoman said today.

Patrick Syring, a foreign service officer with the U.S. State Department, was indicted Wednesday by federal prosecutors for sending threatening e-mail and voice mail messages to the Arab American Institute, a group based in Washington, D.C., that has a Michigan office in Dearborn.

"This is Patrick Syring," he said on one voice mail left on July 17, 2006, according to the indictment filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. "The only good Lebanese is a dead Lebanese. The only good Arab is a dead Arab…Death to Lebanon and death to the Arabs."