IRAQ:Iraq will review the status of all security companies after this week's "flagrant assault" by contractors from the US firm Blackwater in which 11 people were shot dead, the government said yesterday.
Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the cabinet backed an interior ministry decision to "halt the licence" of Blackwater, which provides security for the US embassy, and launch an immediate investigation into the shooting.
He later said the Iraqi and US governments had set up a joint committee to investigate the killings, which occurred when Blackwater contractors opened fire randomly after mortar rounds landed near their convoy in western Baghdad on Sunday.
Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, adding his voice to Iraqi anger over the incident, urged the government to "cancel this company's work, and the rest of the criminal and intelligence companies".
Estimates of the number of security contractors employed by mainly US and European firms across Iraq range from between 25,000 and 48,000.
In fresh violence, four car bombs in Baghdad killed 17 people and wounded 50, police said.
An explosion near a US patrol also killed three soldiers and wounded three others in Diyala province, north of Baghdad, the military said. It gave no details on the type of explosion, but many soldiers are killed by roadside bombs.
"Cabinet affirmed . . . the need to review the situation of foreign and local security companies working in Iraq, in accordance with Iraqi laws," Mr Dabbagh said. "This came after the flagrant assault conducted by members of the American security company Blackwater against Iraqi citizens," he said in a statement.
Blackwater said its guards reacted "lawfully and appropriately" to a hostile attack. It said late on Monday it had received no official notice from Iraq's interior ministry.
US state department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters in Washington the US government had not been officially informed that Blackwater's licence had been withdrawn.
He said the jurisdiction over any crimes that might have been committed would depend on the circumstances and stressed the state department does not know whether any rules or laws were broken despite the loss of "innocent" life.
Britain, meanwhile, is poised to announce significant cuts in the number of troops in southern Iraq following an upbeat assessment by US and British military officials in London yesterday.
An announcement on further cuts in British troops could be made as early as October 8th when Gordon Brown is due to make a statement to MPs when the House of Commons returns after its summer break. A reduction of 500 troops out of a total of 5,500 has already been announced.
Amid concern about the mounting tensions between Washington and Tehran, Gen David Petraeus, the American military commander in Iraq and Ryan Crocker, the US ambassador to Baghdad, also kept up the pressure on Iran, saying its repeated calls for dialogue with the US were irrelevant as long as it continued supporting Iraqi militias.