Word: greenes
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During his speech on New Year's Day to celebrate the official transfer of Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone to Iraqi control, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki declared Jan. 1 the "day of sovereignty" and congratulated his compatriots for having waited so long. He also warned that an Iranian resistance group, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), would no longer be able to have a base on Iraqi territory. (See pictures of life returning to Iraq's streets...
...most part, however, the MEK is no more popular with the Iraqi population than it is with the central government. In his speech from the Green Zone on New Year's Day, al-Maliki made it clear that the MEK would lose its protected status. "This group has been labeled a terrorist organization," al-Maliki said. "It can no longer operate in Iraq after today because it has caused a political crisis that contradicts the constitution ... We will never force any of these people to go back to their country ... but Iraq cannot be a base for these people...
...months ago, as Iraqi and U.S. forces clashed with radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army, I would have been forced to wear whatever our male Iraqi security guards picked out without me. Last March, I arrived to an onslaught of rockets and mortars fired at the nearby Green Zone, along with retaliatory coalition air strikes and the near constant thunder of helicopter blades overhead. As with other foreign reporters, my movements were always calculated, and I often donned a long black abaya and head scarf. But this time around, I was one of the few women wearing...
...formally handed control of the Green Zone, the fortified U.S. and Iraqi-government stronghold, back to the Iraqis. The Americans also vacated the compound's ornate Republican Palace - Saddam Hussein's jewel, which the U.S. used as its administrative and then diplomatic headquarters throughout the occupation. U.S. soldiers are now technically guests on Iraqi soil under the new U.S.-Iraqi security pact...
...million complex within the Green Zone is a significant step away from the U.S. government's former headquarters in Saddam Hussein's ornate, marble-filled republican palace, which was handed back to the Iraqis when the clock struck midnight on New Year's Eve. The new place is stark and practical - like a "straightforward business office," except with heavy security, says Master Sergeant Patrick McDonald, who heads the embassy's work on the upcoming Iraqi elections. He adds, "In a way, you sort of miss the touch of Saddam...