wonder about Jordan's King no longer - he's smirk's man

[donsu]

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=637424



King of Jordan to pardon Iraq's deputy PM over $300m bank fraud


King Abdullah of Jordan has agreed to pardon Ahmed Chalabi, the controversial Iraqi political leader, who was sentenced to 22 years in prison for fraud after his bank collapsed with $300m (£160m) in missing deposits in 1989.

Jalal Talabani, the Iraqi President, asked the king to resolve the differences between Jordan and Mr Chalabi, now Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, during a visit to Ammanthis week.

Latif Rashid, the Iraqi minister of water resources, said Mr Talabani confirmed to him that King Abdullah had promised, in effect, to quash the conviction. He expected there would first be a meeting between Jordanian officials and Mr Chalabi "who has some questions of his own."

The expected pardon, is the latest twist in the extraordinary career of Mr Chalabi, now again in the ascendant as an important member of the Shia coalition and the new Iraqi government. Only a year ago US soldiers raided his house in Baghdad, put a gun to his head, arrested two of his supporters and seized papers. He was accused of passing intelligence information to Iran.
-snip-
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[atreides1]

1. Not His Father's Son

King Hussein would be ashamed.

[pie]

2. I thought he was a better man than that

[GreenPartyVoter]

3. *sigh* Is there no one on this planet who will stand up to the Chimperor

besides Pooty-poot, who is just as bad?

[donsu]

4. Chavez, Castro, Mandela to name a few

nt

[Thrasybulus]

6. What would you have Abdullah do?

His situation is untenable. Given Bush's unscrupulous use of power I seriously doubt that King Hussein would have been able to resist the pressures.

If Abdullah stood up to Bush he would be isolated and because he is not an Islamic fundamentalist he would be crushed between the two. He still may be but he--like his father--is playing for time.

One thing seems apparent, that Chalabi is still our man. The raid on his headquarters by American troops and claims that he was also working with the Iranians was just a sham.

If we believed he worked with the Iranians we would not have allowed Abdullah to pardon him. Nor would we have allowed Chalabi virtual control of the Iraqi gov't. by controlling the Oil Ministry and thus the revenue of Iraq.

The raid was staged to distance Chalabi from the Americans in the eyes of the Iraqi people.

[hopein08]

5. He hasn't officially agreed to the pardon...

Abdullah is only considering it...

See here!

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050512/ts_nm/iraq_jordan_chalabi_dc_3