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# Iraq For Sale
- URL: https://www.protein.xyz/iraq-for-sale/
- Published: 2003-10-03T16:49:11.000Z
- Updated: 2016-06-04T22:27:26.000Z
- Description: Iraq is up for sale, but not everyone is entitled to bid. A study by the George Soros-backed Open Society Initiative sheds some…
- Author: Protein
- Tags: Seeds, #protein, #Import 2024-06-11 13:21

Iraq is up for sale, but not everyone is entitled to bid. A study by the George Soros-backed Open Society Initiative sheds some light on the current auction for Iraq's cellular telephony infrastructure, a market that it is estimated to be worth $6 billion by 2008\. And it concludes that the bidding process - subject to several amendments already - has been geared to exclude local talent. It's not, as first suspected, a no-bid stitch up. But [Iraq Revenue Watch ](http://www.iraqrevenuewatch.org/?ref=protein.xyz)has noted that restrictions prevent nationalized telecoms companies from bidding, which excludes some of the largest European and Asian carriers, and more pertinently, local Arab carriers including the company which has already activated a network in Iraq. And there's no requirement that bidders employ local talent. (This conflicts with the Q&A helpfully provided by the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) to the press which states "There is no restriction on who can apply". The new strings were attached after the initial bidding round closed, on August 8.) The Coalition Provisional Authority's stipulation that no carrier in which more than a 10 per cent stake is owned by a national government rules out Bahrain's Batelco, the Emirates' Etisalat and Kuwaiti MTC-Vodafone, as well as Orange (now owned by France Telecom) and Deutsche Telecom-owned T-Mobile, amongst others. Read the full article at [The Register](http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/59/33144.html?ref=protein.xyz)