White House eagerly highlights the departure of U.S. combat troops from Iraq

WASHINGTON As the White House eagerly highlights the departure of U.S. combat troops from Iraq, the small army of American diplomats left behind is embarking on a long and perilous path to keeping the volatile country from slipping back to the brink of civil war.Among the challenges are helping Iraq’s deeply divided politicians form a new government; refereeing long-simmering Arab-Kurd territorial disputes; advising on attracting foreign investment; pushing for improved government services; and fleshing out a blueprint for future U.S.-Iraqi relations.

President Barack Obama also is banking on the diplomats – about 300, protected by as many as 7,000 private security contractors – to assume the duties of the U.S. military. That includes protecting U.S. personnel from attack and managing the training of Iraqi police, starting in October 2011.The Iraq insurgency, which began shortly after U.S. troops toppled Baghdad in April 2003, is why the U.S. only now is entering the post-combat phase of stabilizing Iraq. Originally, the U.S. thought Iraq would be peaceful within months of the invasion, allowing for a short-lived occupation and the relatively quick emergence of a viable government.Although the insurgency has been reduced to what one analyst terms a “lethal nuisance,” it will complicate the State Department’s mission and test Iraq’s security forces.Much is at stake as the department negotiates with the Pentagon over acquiring enough Black Hawk helicopters, bomb-resistant vehicles and other heavy gear to outfit its own protection force in Iraq.

“Regardless of the reasons for going to war, everything now depends on a successful transition to an effective and unified Iraqi government and Iraqi security forces that can bring both security and stability to the average Iraqi,” says Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. In his view that transition will take five years to 10 years.

The question is whether progress will be interrupted or reversed once American combat power is gone.The U.S. will have 50,000 troops in Iraq when the combat mission officially ends Aug. 31; they are scheduled to draw down to zero by Dec. 31, 2011. Until then, they will advise and train Iraqi security forces, and provide security and transport for the diplomats.

Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said in an interview to be broadcast Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that he believes Iraq’s security forces have matured to the point where they will be ready to shoulder enough of the burden to permit the remaining 50,000 U.S. soldiers to go home at the end of next year.”My assessment today is they – they will be,” Odierno said, according to an excerpt of the interview released Saturday by CNN.”We continue to see development in planning, in their ability to conduct operations,” he added. “We continue to see political development, economic development and all of these combined together will start to create an atmosphere that creates better security.”

Once the U.S. troops are gone, the State Department will be responsible for the security of its personnel.Obama administration officials say the diplomats are well prepared for what the State Department expects to be a three to five-year transition to a “normal” U.S.-Iraqi relationship.”We are fully prepared to assume our responsibilities as we move through this transition from a military-led effort to a civilian-led effort,” department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.

Iraq watchers have their doubts.Kenneth M. Pollack, a frequent visitor to Iraq as director of Middle East policy at the Brookings Institution, says the administration is in danger of underestimating the difficulty it faces.”One of the biggest mistakes that most Americans are making is assuming that Iraq can’t slide back into civil war. It can,” Pollack said. “This thing can go bad very easily.”Pollack, who does not consider himself a pessimist on Iraq, said the historical record on civil wars around the globe shows that about half repeat themselves.

“So it is a huge mistake to assume it can’t” happen in Iraq, whose civil strife in 2005-07 was so violent that many Americans assumed the war was lost and believed U.S. troops should give up and go home.Pollack considers the State Department ill-suited for its new tasks – starting with the police training mission and including the complex developmental problems such as improving Iraq’s water system.”What the State Department is being asked to do isn’t in their DNA,” Pollack said.The department has been strongly criticized for its past work in Iraqi police training. An October 2007 report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, Stuart W. Bowen Jr., said the State Department had so badly managed a February 2004 contract for Iraqi police training that the department could not tell what it got for the $1.2 billion it spent.

In May 2004 President George W. Bush put the Pentagon in charge of all security force development.The newly departed U.S. ambassador to Baghdad, Christopher Hill, says he sees brighter days ahead for Iraq, but he also laments “woefully low” supplies of electricity and deeply ingrained tensions among the three main competitors for political power: Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds.”There is a mountain of mistrust,” Hill said.The diplomats’ postwar task would have been much easier if, as the administration once hoped, Iraq had formed a new government by now, nearly six months after its March 7 national elections.Instead, the political stalemate   with no end in sight – has created another hurdle to the central U.S. goal in Iraq: translating hard-fought security gains into stability.Still, there is optimism in some quarters.

“While there are no guarantees, the prospects for Iraq’s security and stability beyond 2011 look as good or better than they have at any time in the recent past,” John Negroponte, who was U.S. ambassador to Iraq in 2004-05, wrote Thursday in a ForeignPolicy.com blog.Another complication is the shake up of key U.S. players in Baghdad.Odierno leaves Baghdad on Sept. 1 for a new assignment in the U.S., and Gen. David Petraeus, who was Odierno’s boss as head of Central Command, switched last month to take command in Afghanistan. Hill was replaced in Baghdad this past week by James Jeffrey, who was the U.S. ambassador to Turkey.(AP)

London Euro slumped back against the U.S. dollar on Monday

London Euro slumped back against the U.S. dollar on Monday, as investors adjust positions ahead of Federal Reserve meeting, which some believe could announce new measures to boost the sluggish recovery.Dealers said the euro rose in early trading very strongly supported by the German trade figures which show Europe’s economic giant will help drive growth across the region.As the day develops, markets anticipate that the Fed could announce new stimulus steps in a meeting on Tuesday which will be positive for the dollar with the increase in U.S. economic prospects.

However, choppy trade with investors reluctant to make big commitments awaiting the Fed’s statement after the closely watched U.S. jobs report on Friday is much worse than expected.In late trading in London, the euro was at 1.3236 dollars, the highest in the early retreat of around 1.3283 dollars, down from 1.3276 dollars late Friday in New York.

Against the Japanese yen, the dollar is stronger at 85.86 yen from 85.48 yen on Friday.Michael Hewson of CMC Markets in London said the attention of everyone there at the Fed.”The results that will dominate this week’s sentiment   What will become of certain records would be a tone of language used in the statement of work, especially after the data is weaker than expected on Friday,” said Hewson.Forex.com said Jane Foley of choppy trade “as the market grappled with the possibility of facing the Federal Reserve.”,”Payrolls Friday may have been disappointing, but the market still was not sure because if the data illustrate a major slowdown in U.S. economic sukup” which will prompt the Fed to take new action, he said.

With interest rates near zero percent, analysts had suggested the Fed could mempertimbangkankebijakan based monetary stimulus, including a new pumping money directly into the system to increase the demand for credit.Earlier, Germany’s second largest exporter in the world after China, said exports in June surged 28.5 percent to 86.5 billion euros (115 billion dollars), the highest level since October 2008.

Meanwhile, imports surged 31.7 percent to reach a new record of 72.4 billion euros, meaning that the German trade partners also work well.”This has increased the possibility of Germany’s economy grew faster in the second quarter from the previous assumptions,” said Commerzbank analyst, Simon Junker.In London trading, the euro changed hands at 1.3236 dollars against 1.3276 dollars on Friday, at 113.65 yen (113.50), 0.8297 British pounds (0.8326) and 1.3851 Swiss francs (1, 3788).Dollar stood at 85.86 yen (85.48) and 1.0466 Swiss francs (1.0378). The pound was at 1.5951 dollars (1.5941).On the London Bullion Market, gold prices slid to 1203 dollars per ounce from 1207.75 dollars per ounce on Friday. (  AFP) –

World Cup helps ESPN's expansion plans

NEW YORK ESPN marketers will fan out to bars in ethnic enclaves during World Cup matches to pass out schedules and posters, just one way the sports network is using the quadrennial event to build new audiences in both the U.S. and internationally.The network’s large presence of 300 staff members in South Africa for the soccer tournament could also be seen as a dry run to help a future Olympics bid.

Either ESPN, ESPN2 or corporate sister ABC is televising every one of the 64 scheduled matches in the first year the company has the American television rights to the tournament. ESPN leased rights to televise some games in 2006, covering some of the matches with announcing teams based in a Connecticut studio.

“We think it’s a chance to advance the notion that we are a global entity,” said John Skipper, the network’s executive vice president for content.One way to do that is to start at home. ESPN will promote itself heavily in areas where the network’s emphasis on American sports makes it less interesting to residents. The Greek enclave in Queens, N.Y., San Francisco’s Italian section, Boston’s Portuguese neighborhoods and Los Angeles’ Korean communities – all with fans keen on rooting on ancestral homelands – are among the areas that will get special attention.

Besides sending people to gathering places where the games are being watched, ESPN commissioned a South African artist to make posters honoring each of the participating countries, mixing historical and soccer themes. The U.S. poster, for example, commemorates George Washington crossing the Delaware, with soccer players standing in for his troops.

The network has equipped food trucks with a giant TV on the roof, passing out specialty foods from some of the participating countries in New York and Los Angeles, said Seth Ader, the network’s sports marketing senior director.Online and on ESPN Radio, the company will give fans the option of hearing broadcasts in different languages, including Chinese, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Korean and Portuguese.

In the U.S., Univision has the rights to Spanish-language broadcasts of the matches. Although ESPN can’t offer Spanish-language broadcasts of the matches, it is moving into the territory by offering 10 hours a day of studio-based Spanish content on its ESPN Deportes network.

Getting an identification as a destination for soccer fans “is a long-term business proposition for us,” Ader said. Showing the World Cup telecast can drum up interest in U.S.-based professional soccer, which ESPN has rights to televise. World Cup soccer is also expected to be a draw for ESPN’s mobile business, too.

Soccer is also key to ESPN’s efforts to expand in international markets. The network made a big move last year by purchasing the rights to show some games in England’s Barclays Premier League.”In order to get a foothold in a number of international markets, they need to get soccer content,” said David Joyce, an analyst for Miller Tabak & Co.

Having a home team helps ESPN but isn’t vital to success, the network’s executives believe. ESPN’s experience covering the European championship in 2008 was instructive: There was no U.S. team for which to root, but ethnic pockets of fans helped the network draw a strong audience, Ader said.

For ESPN, there’s another important audience that will be watching. Following NBC’s coverage of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, rights to future games are up for grabs, and ESPN is expected to be interested. A strong performance at the World Cup could show doubting Olympics officials that ESPN would be up to covering a large, multifaceted event.

“I never think of this as a dress rehearsal,” ESPN’s Skipper said. “We think this entity is special enough as itself to merit this sort of attention. If there were no such thing as the Olympics, we would do the same thing. Having said that, we do believe this will demonstrate to people what we can do with a big quadrennial event. That’s an ancillary benefit.” (AP)

BP say capturing more oil from blown is out well

Energy giant BP Plc said on Tuesday it had sharply increased the amount of oil it was capturing from its blown-out Gulf of Mexico well, but U.S. officials want to know exactly how much oil is still gushing out.The London-based company’s share price fell 6 percent in London trading after U.S. President Barack Obama said he wanted to know “whose ass to kick” over the massive spill.He told NBC News’ “Today” show that if BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward worked for him, he would have fired him by now over his response to the 50-day-old spill, the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history.

BP already faces a criminal investigation and lawsuits over the April 20 explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that killed 11 workers and triggered the massive spill. Some 120 miles of U.S. coastline have been soiled in the disaster that threatens the Gulf Coast’s lucrative fishing industry.

The company said on Tuesday it had collected 14,800 barrels of oil on Monday, 33 percent higher than the amount collected on Sunday and the highest capture rate since it installed a new system to contain the oil spill last week.The latest attempt involves a containment cap placed on top of the gushing pipe on the ocean floor. The total amount of oil collected over four days was about 42,500 barrels, BP said.

“We continue to optimize production and make sure we can take much oil out of that stream as we can,” said Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, the top U.S. official overseeing the cleanup effort, speaking at a briefing in Washington.Allen said on Monday neither BP nor the government knew just how much oil was gushing out of the well in the first place. “That’s the big unknown right now,” he told a White House briefing on Monday.

BP has given conservative estimates of the oil flow that have been ridiculed by scientists and U.S. lawmakers. Even the government’s much higher estimates of 12,000-19,000 barrels a day seemed on the low side after Allen said the company planned to double its collection of oil from the well to 20,000 bpd (840,000 gallons/3.18 million liters).BP and government officials have said a definitive solution will not come until August when a relief well is drilled.

OBAMA HITS BACK AT CRITICS

The spill has fouled wildlife refuges in Louisiana and barrier islands in Mississippi and Alabama and also sent tar balls ashore on northwest beaches of Florida, where the $60 billion-a-year tourism industry accounts for nearly 1 million jobs.One-third of the Gulf’s federal waters, or 78,000 square miles (200,000 square km), remains closed to fishing, and the toll of dead and injured birds and marine animals is climbing.U.S. weather forecasters gave their first confirmation that some of the oil leaking from BP’s well has lingered beneath the surface rather than rising to the surface. Undersea oil depletes the water’s oxygen content and threatens marine life like mussels, clams, crabs, eels, jellyfish and shrimp.

Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said at the Washington briefing: “NOAA is confirming the presence of very low concentrations of subsurface oil.”Obama, who faces growing criticism that he has appeared detached from the economic and ecological catastrophe hitting four U.S. Gulf states, sharpened his criticism of BP in the NBC interview and hit back at his critics.”I was down there a month ago, before most of these talking heads were even paying attention to the Gulf,” he said.

“And I don’t sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar; we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick,” he added.Fadel Gheit, an analyst at Oppenheimer and Co, said it was “not a coincidence” that BP’s shares were down after Obama’s “kick ass” comment.

The European oils sector was down overall, however, on the back of lower oil prices due to economic worries. BP shares were trading down about 5 percent, against a drop of 2.13 percent in the STOXX Europe 600 Oil and Gas index at 1600 GMT.In New York, the company’s American depositary shares were down nearly 5 percent. BP shares have lost about a third of their value since the crisis erupted.

Away from the action in the Gulf, the political heat remained intense in Washington with yet another congressional hearing to bring BP and its peers under renewed scrutiny.The Senate Judiciary Committee was holding a hearing titled: “The Risky Business of Big Oil: Have Recent Court Decisions and Liability Caps Encouraged Irresponsible Corporate Behavior?”Democrats in Congress have been looking at lifting such caps.

The Senate hearing follows one in Chalmette, Louisiana, where two women who lost their husbands in the explosion that unleashed the crisis urged members of Congress to hold BP accountable.”I am asking you to please consider harsh punishments on companies who choose to ignore safety standards before other families are destroyed,” said Courtney Kemp, whose husband, Wyatt, was killed in the explosion.(Reuters)

Los Angeles City Council to consider $56-million Arizona boycott over illegal-immigration law

The Los Angeles City Council could take a significant step in protesting Arizona’s crackdown on illegal immigration Wednesday when it considers up to $56 million in Arizona-related investments the city could boycott.The list includes airline service into Arizona and the harbor’s clean truck incentive program.Officials are recommending that the City Council suspend travel to the state, refrain from entering new contracts and review current ones for possible termination.

Los Angeles officials joined with other cities across the country in calling for an economic boycott of Arizona after lawmakers there passed a tough immigration law that critics say will lead to racial profiling.The law, which will take effect July 23, makes it a crime for unauthorized migrants to be in Arizona and requires police to check the immigration papers of those they suspect may be in the country illegally.The report was prepared by Chief Legislative Analyst Gerry F. Miller, who recommended that the council adopt a revised resolution that expresses city opposition to the use of federal funds to implement the Arizona law, saying it encourages racial profiling, violates constitutional guarantees of due process and equal protection and undermines federal authority over immigration.

The proposed resolution notes that the city imposed economic sanctions in the past to protest such actions as South Africa’s apartheid policies and Colorado’s 1992 repeal of local ordinances that banned discrimination based on sexual orientation.

“This is not just about Los Angeles; it’s a significant response to legislation that hurts a whole slice of the population,” said Councilman Ed Reyes, one of seven council members calling for a boycott. “We hope to create an economic ripple effect not only in dollars but also in sending a message to others concerning the discriminatory effect of this legislation.”

However, the Harbor Department and Los Angeles World Airports expressed concern about possible termination of their contracts with Arizona businesses. The Harbor Department, for instance, has four contracts with Arizona firms totaling $25.6 million, mostly involving a clean truck incentive program.Under the program, three Arizona firms have brought hundreds of newer short-haul trucks with significantly lower emissions into Southern California. The harbor’s $56-million program is projected to reduce port-related truck pollution 80% by 2012.

“The program has been phenomenally successful,” said Arley Baker, a port spokesman. “We don’t recommend rescinding the contracts due to adverse effects on the environment and public health.”Los Angeles World Airports has three equipment and maintenance contracts worth $77,000 and receives $22 million in revenue from two Arizona-based airlines US Airways and Mesa Air.”We need to do additional research into our ability to limit Arizona-based airlines from using LAWA airports,” said airport spokeswoman Nancy Suey Castles.

Reyes said he also supports a cautious approach to make sure the city would not be sued over any boycott action. The analyst’s report contains several caveats, such as refraining from entering new contracts with Arizona “to the extent practicable and in instances where there is no significant additional cost to the City nor conflict with the law.””We still need to be careful how we approach it so we aren’t vulnerable to legal actions that would have a whiplash effect on our general funds,” Reyes said.

United States Steel Corp. continues to see improved demand for steel used in products such as appliances, automobiles and heavy industrial equipment

DENVER United States Steel Corp. continues to see improved demand for steel used in products such as appliances, automobiles and heavy industrial equipment.That improvement is slowly working its way to the steelmaker’s bottom line.The Pittsburgh manufacturer reported a narrower loss for the first three months of the year and its best result since it reported a profit in the last quarter of 2008. The company predicted more improvement in the current quarter as shipments increase and prices rise, although it cautioned that raw materials also continue to rise.

U.S. Steel is the latest steel maker to note a gradual improvement in business after struggling through a difficult 2009 when recession-battered customers cut back on orders.”Our operating results have been making a slow and steady recovery since hitting a low point in the first quarter of 2009 until this quarter, when the benefits of improved utilization rates and selling prices began to be realized in a more significant way,” John P. Surma, chairman and CEO, told analysts during a conference call.

Surma said all of the company’s operating segments should be profitable in the second quarter, a little sooner than Wall Street had been expecting.”Gradually improving business conditions should be reflected in our operating results,” he said in a statement.The results are an indication of both an improving global economy and a slow turnaround in the U.S., Argus Research analyst Bill Selesky said.He noted U.S. Steel is increasing production at some facilities. “They would not do that unless they thought they had a window here where demand was going up,” he said.

U.S. Steel reported a loss of $157 million, or $1.10 per share, for the quarter. A year ago, it lost $439 million, or $3.78 per share.Revenue rose 42 percent to $3.9 billion from $2.75 billion.Prices for flat-rolled steel, used in everything from automobiles to appliances, fell to $654 a net ton from $715 a net ton a year ago. But they improved from the fourth quarter.Prices also fell year over year in U.S. Steel’s European operations and in the tubular business, which produces pipe products.

Yet companywide, overall shipments jumped 67.5 percent from a year ago.Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, on average, had predicted a loss of $1.43 a share on revenue of $3.75 billion. Such estimates typically exclude one-time items.U.S. Steel said cost-cutting measures that it has taken in the past year have made operations more efficient.

In the months ahead, the company expects to see higher costs for coal used in the steelmaking process and iron ore for its European operations. Although U.S. Steel has its own iron ore source for North American operations, it expects to pay more for the raw material in Europe.Manufacturers that buy iron ore in the marketplace are expected to pay more because of a new international system that allows prices to be set quarterly instead of annually.

Shares fell $3.44, or 5.7 percent, to close at $56.63.U.S. stocks fell overall after Standard & Poor’s downgraded the debt of Greece and Portugal. The move intensified investors’ fears that Europe’s debt problems are spreading.(AP)

Facebook beat Google's search engine giant for the first time

social networking site Facebook has become the most popular in the United States (U.S.), last week. This also marks the success of Facebook beat Google’s search engine giant for the first time.Experian network analyst firm Hitwise said that the number of visitors for Facebook much more than Google visitors until 13 March.”This shows that the content sharing service more attractive and encourage people to surf the Internet,” said Hitwise spokesman Matt Tatham was quoted as saying on CNN television stations pages.Tatham said that the primacy of Facebook also shows that more people trust the opinions of their friends than the results offered by search engines. “Ease of sharing information and content offered by Facebook is the key to their success,” said Tatham to Computerworld.

A total of 7.07 percent of U.S. Internet users visit Facebook last week, while Google’s 7.03 percent accessible. Then in succession Yahoo! Mail to 3.80 percent, the main site Yahoo 3.67 percent, 2.14 percent and YouTube.Although the difference in visits to Facebook and Google is very thin, but the growth of Facebook far beyond Google. Compared with the same period last year, the number of visits to Facebook increased by 185 percent while traffic to Google is only increased 9 percent.”This victory is certainly of great significance for Facebook, although the difference is very small,” said Tatham.

Iraqi prime minister's bloc says it has started laying the groundwork to form a coalition government after preliminary election results

The Iraqi prime minister’s bloc says it has started laying the groundwork to form a coalition government after preliminary election results showed it winning in at least two southern provinces.Friday’s announcement that Nouri al-Maliki’s alliance has created a committee to open talks with other groups signals growing optimism about a strong showing in the parliamentary balloting.

Partial tallies have only been released from only five of Iraq’s 18 provinces, excluding Baghdad. They show the prime minister and his secular rival, former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, locked in a tight contest amid fraud allegations.

But Al-Maliki supporter Abbas al-Bayati says the alliance has already reached out to other parties and believes it will need at least two allies.
First results from Iraq’s parliamentary election showed the prime minister and his secular rival locked in an extremely tight contest Thursday amid fraud allegations by rival parties and a chaotic, unpredictable vote count.The partial tallies came from only five of Iraq’s 18 provinces. However, Iraqi officials who have seen results from across the country said Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s coalition appeared to have a narrow edge, though not an outright majority.

That foreshadows tough and lengthy negotiations to build a government and choose a prime minister.The partial results, posted on TV screens in Baghdad to crowds of reporters, were the first in an election that will determine who governs the country as U.S. troops go home – and whether Iraqis can put behind them deep sectarian tensions that once brought their nation to the brink of civil war.

The initial tallies from Sunday’s vote suggested an exceedingly tight contest between coalitions led by al-Maliki, who gained popularity as security improved, and former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite who sharply criticized the prime minister for failing to boost reconciliation efforts between Iraq’s factions.The emerging picture was a setback to hard-line religious Shiite political leaders who saw al-Maliki make gains in two southern provinces deep on their turf. Allawi appeared to be drawing on Sunni support north of Baghdad.Results did not include the race’s big prize – Baghdad – which accounts for 70 of the parliament’s 325 seats.

Thursday’s announcement set off a wave of fraud accusations, largely from Allawi’s Iraqiya coalition which said it uncovered dozens of violations. It said these included soldiers not being allowed to vote, interference in the electoral commission’s work and some polling stations failing to post results.In a statement, the group said it found “rigging to an extent that would render the elections useless for reflecting the voice of the Iraqis.”Election commission officials did not respond specifically to the allegations, but said the commission had received more than 1,000 complaints about potential violations, all of which would be investigated.

Al-Maliki gained ground against hard-line religious parties in two southern provinces. In Babil, where about a third of the ballots had been counted, the prime minister’s State of Law coalition won some 69,000 votes. He also came out on top in Najaf, where his bloc won some 56,000 votes.The tallies were a blow to al-Maliki’s main Shiite competition, the religious Iraqi National Alliance, which includes a party led by anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Since rising to prominence as part of a Shiite coalition that won the 2005 elections, al-Maliki has tried to recast himself as an inclusive leader for all Iraqis.Allawi’s non-sectarian Iraqiya list, which included Sunni candidates, fared better in central Iraq, where there are more Sunni voters. In Diyala province, Iraqiya received almost 43,000 votes, more than four time’s al-Maliki’s take. In Salahuddin, Allawi’s list had more than 34,000 votes, about five times that of al-Maliki.

Analyst Joost Hilterman of the International Crisis Group said the initial results were largely what he expected. He cautioned that final calls are hard to make without knowing about Baghdad.”Who gets Baghdad is still the most important thing,” he said.

Results from a fifth province, Irbil, showed the Kurdish Alliance, representing the two main Kurdish parties, defeating the upstart Kurdish party, Gorran, in the self-rule territory.Iraqi officials who have seen wider counts from across the country said al-Maliki’s coalition appeared to be coming out on top.

Speaking to Al-Jazeera TV, Ammar al-Hakim, who heads the Shiite Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, said al-Maliki’s bloc was ahead “by some seats.” He said the assessment was based on information supplied by 40,000 observers from his alliance.Almost all Iraqi political parties and coalitions post observers at polling stations and counting centers across the country, serving as a check against fraud.Chaos reigned through much of the day before the first results were posted on large TV screens, with election officials offering different explanations of how much information would be released and when.

The officials said they had no deadline for releasing final results and were undecided about whether they would make public more results Friday.

Leaders from competing political parties visited the counting center during the day, which officials said helped ensure the count’s transparency. Others questioned the appropriateness of candidates getting so close to the counting process.Al-Maliki underwent surgery Wednesday but was quickly released from the hospital and back at work Thursday, according to a statement from his office. An adviser, Yassin Majid, said the surgery was “simple,” but refused to say what it entailed.

Facebook Inc. is expanding a service called Facebook Credits that gives it a 30 percent cut of sales from tractors

Facebook Inc. is expanding a service called Facebook Credits that gives it a 30 percent cut of sales from tractors, fish food and guns in online games, according to four people who have held discussions with the company.Facebook is already testing the payment option in at least 17 games, including “Happy Aquarium” and “Restaurant City.” The company will make the service available in more games ahead of its annual developers conference in April, said the people, who declined to be named because the plans aren’t public.After relying on advertising for almost all of its revenue, Facebook is moving to take a bigger piece of the market for virtual items bought in games, which may quadruple to $3.6 billion in the U.S. by 2012, according to ThinkEquity LLC. Today, almost all of those sales go to the game developers, such as Zynga Inc., creator of “FarmVille,” and Electronic Arts Inc.’s Playfish unit.

“It will likely be a significant revenue stream,” said Jeremy Liew, a managing director at Menlo Park, California-based Lightspeed Venture Partners who invests in social games. “They’ll keep working on it until it makes economic sense for developers.”Facebook, the most popular social-networking site, allows outside developers to offer games to its 400 million users. The games are free, and players can pay for items that advance their progress, such as a $3.33 tractor in “FarmVille,” a $5.95 helicopter in “Mafia Wars” or a $4.89 box of fish food for “Happy Aquarium.”
Facebook Cut
The Palo Alto, California-based company is seeking to take advantage of the popularity of online games, a market that has already blossomed in Asia. Shares of Tencent Holdings Ltd., a game company in Shenzhen, China, tripled in the past year, giving it a market value of $35 billion. Facebook is also taking a page from Apple Inc., which gets a 30 percent cut of sales from iPhone apps.Today, gamers on Facebook can either buy Facebook Credits to obtain items in games, or pay for them through third-party services. Of the $3.6 billion in U.S. virtual goods sales in 2012, about $2.2 billion will be on social networks, with 80 percent on Facebook, said Atul Bagga, a ThinkEquity analyst in San Francisco. If all payments on the site use Facebook Credits, that would mean $530 million in revenue for the company, he said.

‘Trust Factor’

“It’s the trust factor,” Bagga said. “You trust Facebook more than you would trust any other payment company.”EBay Inc.’s PayPal unit said yesterday that it will become a payment option for Facebook Credits, allowing PayPal customers to buy the site’s virtual currency. Players can also use credit cards or their mobile phone to buy credits.Payments and virtual currencies will likely be a focus of Facebook’s developers conference, which is scheduled to start April 21 in San Francisco, said three people who have had discussions with the company.

“We are continuing to look at ways to extend our virtual currency Facebook Credits  via a small alpha test with a handful of developers,” Facebook said in an e-mailed statement. “The test started in May and is exploring ways for people to use their Facebook Credits with third-party applications.”Allowing Facebook’s users to buy a single virtual currency that can be spent on all games will probably increase sales for developers, said Vish Makhijani, chief operating officer of San Francisco-based Zynga, the largest creator of games on the site.

‘Additional Liquidity’

“Facebook Credits will drive more people to become buyers,” Makhijani said. “That additional liquidity or ability to spend in more places clearly would be more attractive to a consumer than something you can only spend in one place.”

In rolling out Facebook Credits, the company may still allow players to buy goods using other payment services. Developers would prefer to have Facebook Credits as an option rather than being the exclusive payments provider  because purchases made with Facebook cost them more, said Vikas Gupta, chief executive officer of Jambool Inc., also known as Social Gold, which offers an in-game payment system.“Facebook Credits comes at a pretty high tax,” said Gupta, whose San Francisco-based company charges developers 7 percent to 10 percent per purchase. Still, he said Facebook Credits “will help grow the overall ecosystem so you’ll see more people pay for goods.”

British candy maker Cadbury PLC was thrown further into doubt Tuesday when a major Kraft Foods Inc

Kraft Cadbury

LONDON The battle for British candy maker Cadbury PLC was thrown further into doubt Tuesday when a major Kraft Foods Inc. shareholder voted not to endorse the U.S. company’s hostile takeover bid, even as Kraft sweetened its offer with more cash.Billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. said it had voted against Kraft’s proposal to issue 370 million shares to finance its 10.3 billion pound ($16.5 billion) bid, saying it was worried Kraft would raise the bid even higher.Kraft earlier Tuesday increased the cash part of its offer after agreeing to sell its North American pizza business to Nestle for $3.7 billion. Nestle also said it wouldn’t be making its own offer for Cadbury, as some analyst had speculated.That leaves Kraft the sole bidder for now, though the British maker of Dairy Milk chocolate and Dentyne gum has said it has received expressions of interest from The Hershey Co. of the United States and Italy’s Ferrero International SA.

Cadbury dismissed Kraft’s plan to use the money raised from selling brands such as Tombstone and Jack’s to increase the proportion of cash in its offer as “tinkering.”Shares in the British maker of Dairy Milk chocolate and Dentyne gum were down 3.7 percent at 775 pence, after briefly diving to 764.4 pence following Berkshire Hathaway’s announcement.Berkshire Hathaway, which holds 9.4 percent of Kraft’s stock, said that the share issue would give Kraft “a blank check allowing it to change its offer to Cadbury in any way it wishes.””And we worry very much that, indeed, there will be an additional change from the revision announced this morning,” it added. “To state the matter simply, a shareholder voting “yes” today is authorizing a huge transaction without knowing its cost or the means of payment.”

Kraft, based in Northfield, Illinois, could not immediately be reached for comment on Berkshire Hathaway’s move.Kraft, whose brands include Philadelphia cream cheese and Oreo cookies, earlier said its change to offer reflected calls by some Cadbury shareholders to have more of the offer in cash and “to be more sparing in its use of undervalued Kraft Foods shares as currency for the offer.””Kraft Foods continues to believe that its share price is depressed as a consequence of a number of short term factors which it believes will dissipate once the uncertainty surrounding its offer for Cadbury is resolved,” the company said in a statement.

Kraft said Tuesday it will use an amount equivalent to the net proceeds from the pizza sale, which it estimates to be 60 pence per Cadbury share, to fund a partial cash alternative to its offer.It also extended the deadline for shareholders to accept its bid until Feb. 2 – the last day in the 60-day timetable set by the U.K. Takeover Panel.It has until Jan. 19 to revise its offer further.Berkshire said it will vote to issue shares only if it does not think the final offer hurts value for Kraft shareholders.

Cadbury’s share price is still well above the original 742 pence value of Kraft’s offer – 300 pence in cash and 0.2589 Kraft shares for each Cadbury share – reflecting the odds that changing the cash component is unlikely to be enough to win over shareholders who are seeking a higher overall price.Cadbury, which recently outlined its credentials as a stand-alone company by raising its long-term performance targets and producing better-than-expected profit margins, said the offer continued to undervalue the British company.

“Kraft has once again missed the point,” it said. “Despite this tinkering, the Kraft offer remains unchanged and derisory with less than half the consideration in cash.”Cadbury is due to provide a trading update, including the key Christmas season, next week.Nestle’s earlier decision to rule itself out of the bidding settled rumors that the Swiss maker of Nescafe coffee and KitKat chocolate was gathering a war chest for a rival bid after it agreed to sell off its 52 percent stake in eyecare company Alcon for $28 billion and announced it would spend less cash on share buybacks.

Some analysts still believe that another suitor may emerge.”We think that Hershey is keen to make a deal with Cadbury,” analysts at Numis stockbrokers wrote in a research note. “In reality Nestle is acting as a fund provider to the Cadbury deal and we would not be surprised to see the Swiss group play that role again by buying assets from Hershey, the Kit Kat brand in the U.S. being an obvious candidate.”

Nestle, meanwhile, is gaining a pizza business that includes the Tombstone and Jack’s brands in the U.S., the Delissio brand in Canada and the California Pizza Kitchen trademark license. It also includes two Wisconsin manufacturing facilities in Medford and Little Chute, Wisconsin.Nestle said the acquisition will add a “new strategic pillar” to its frozen food portfolio in the U.S. and Canada, making it a significant player in the $37 billion a year pizza market. Nestle is already represented in the U.S. with brands such as Stouffer’s, Lean Cuisine, Buitoni, Hot Pockets and Lean Pockets.Shares in the Swiss company rose 1.5 percent to 50.95 Swiss francs.About 3,400 employees are expected to transfer to Nestle.(AP)