WP: More Limits Sought for Private Security Teams (in Iraq) [View All]

[DeepModem Mom]

More Limits Sought for Private Security Teams

By Mary Pat Flaherty and Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, April 13, 2004; Page A15


With hostilities flaring in Iraq, the U.S.-led authority wants to tighten controls over the surging number of private armed security teams being hired to protect U.S. government agencies and contractors involved in rebuilding.

With an estimated 20,000 private security workers on the ground, the Coalition Provisional Authority is increasingly concerned about the quality of the security teams, the weapons they use and the rules that will govern them after June 30, when the authority transfers political power to an interim Iraqi government....

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The CPA now restricts the weapons private security teams may use to small arms with ammunition as large as 7.62mm and to some other defensive weapons. A Dec. 31 coalition rule spells out circumstances under which security firms can use deadly force, including self-defense, the defense of people or property specified in their contracts, and the defense of civilians....

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The CPA's program management office is reviewing bids on a master contract to coordinate security among the 10 largest prime contractors and their subcontractors working on $18.4 billion in U.S.-backed reconstruction as they deploy throughout Iraq. In the meantime, the program management office is "trying to get at least some level of intelligence sanitized from the military that could be given to contractors," said Capt. Bruce A. Cole, spokesman for the program management office in Baghdad....

(According to the article: "Thirteen Democratic senators led by Jack Reed (R.I.), (have asked) the Defense Department to provide a tally of how many private armed non-Iraqi security personnel are in Iraq. In their letter, the senators said that 'security in a hostile fire area is a classic military mission. Delegating this mission to private contractors raises serious questions.'")


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A6612-2004Apr12.html