Iraqi corruption, US embassy denial

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David Souter is not the only resident of Weare, NH with political significance. Art Brennan is a retired NH Superior Court judge. I met him briefly when he spoke at the "funeral" of my old roomie, Tommy Banks - who was a friend of Art's. Your average pol would have fled, lest he be seen associating with such a motley bunch! Art is a quiet man, whose integrity extends to the core of his being - if he says it stinks, it'd gag a skunk.

In Iraq, corruption unabated
And our own government is deceiving us about it

Arthur Brennan / For the Monitor
July 18, 2010

I am a retired New Hampshire judge. Like Judge Joseph Laplante and U.S. Attorney John Kacavas I went to Iraq to try to help, and in the summer of 2007 I directed the short-lived U.S. Embassy Office of Accountability and Transparency.

OAT's mission included assisting and advising the three Iraqi ministries responsible for fighting corruption in Iraq. The OAT team worked with Judge Radhi al Radhi, the director of the Iraqi Commission for Public Integrity. My tour of duty was cut short, and the OAT program barely outlasted me. This is because Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's corrupt government was in a fight to the death with Radhi and his investigators, who had uncovered evidence of the theft of billions of dollars by Iraqi leaders allied with the prime minister. The CPI had evidence of the murder of hundreds of Sunnis through the operations of the Iraqi Ministry of Health, which was controlled by a close associate of al-Maliki who eventually became the "czar" of the al-Maliki anticorruption program. This is the same so-called anticorruption organization that Kacavas and Laplante visited.

The Iraqi judiciary is corrupt. This is not because any particular judge is dishonest but because an independent and impartial Iraqi judge making decisions against the leadership of Iraq is very likely to end up dead.

http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/in-iraq-corruption-unabated