Few tears for British in Basra one month on
Source: http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id ... e_month_on
October 2, 2007
BASRA - Residents of Basra say things are calmer since the British "occupiers" moved out a month ago, but only last week a car bomb exploded in Iraq's second city and fears of a Shiite turf war remain.
Around 500 British soldiers slipped away overnight on September 2-3 from their headquarters at Basra Palace, a sumptuous former residence of Saddam Hussein, who was ousted four and a half years ago by a coalition of largely US and British troops.
Although things are relatively calm in Basra, concern that Britain might have pulled back from the city too soon surged on September 25 when a suicide car bomber killed three police trainees outside the force's main headquarters.
Basra's police chief, who survived a roadside bomb attack on Monday in the city centre, has said since the British left that reinforcements are needed to protect the strategically important oil hub.
"Basra is an open city with ports that need additional Iraqi forces from both the army and the police," Major General Abdul Jalil Khalaf told AFP.
"We started restructuring the police force as we found corruption. I admit there is organised crime for kidnapping and robbery but we will put an end to that," he added.
Britain's Gordon Brown paid a visit Tuesday to the 5,250 British troops currently based at Basra airport on the second leg of his maiden trip to Iraq since becoming prime minister.
He announced earlier in Baghdad that 1,000 British troops could be home by Christmas and that Iraqi forces could be responsible for Basra province within the next two months.
Despite the lingering violence and the bloody rivalry between competing strands of Shiite militia, the word on the street is that Basra is happy the British are gone because things are improving.
"We have become free because there is no occupier inside the city," Imad Khalaf, 52, told AFP as he strolled through the market with his children.
"Markets are full of people day and night, you can see families walking freely in the gardens and parks."
A Western diplomat who is well-informed of Britain's situation in Basra told AFP that attacks were down, partly because the insurgents' "rationale was no longer valid."
Certainly around the palace, a constant target of mortars and arms fire when occupied by the British, the mood has changed and people have started returning to their abandoned houses as the risk of violence has diminished.
Where British tanks once rolled, Iraqi military and police units now patrol -- city streets crowded with people enjoying the relative calm and markets open until 11 pm (2000 GMT).
"We were afraid, but when British forces withdrew we started to go out at night with our children for shopping or walking," said Laila Qasim, 32.
"The country must be protected by its own people," she added, speaking for many in the city.
Perched on the banks of the Shatt al-Arab waterway, where the Tigris River meets the Euphrates, Basra is vital to Iraq's economy because it controls the country's oil terminals in the Gulf and an access to the sea.
Trouble, however, is brewing among the powerful oil trade unions, bad news in a country where 90 percent of its revenue comes from oil.
"The oil and gas law includes clauses that take Iraq back to the bad old days of British colonialism," said Faraj Rabbat Mizban, a spokesman from the Oil Unions Federation.
"We tried to discuss the contracts with the minister but we received no answer so far."
Despite their many fears for the future, Iraqis in Basra are rejoicing for the moment at seeing their own faces in charge of security rather than the British.
"We get happy when we see trucks of the Iraqi army patrolling the city and the patrols of the police carrying out their jobs accurately in a way better than the British forces did," said Saad Shibib, 46.
"True there are some violations like robberies but in general the army is in control."
