MERIP Media Resource List, December 13, 2005

AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEWS on the following topic:
- Iraq parliamentary election, December 15

QUIL LAWRENCE
Quil Lawrence is a BBC reporter who covers Iraq and Turkey for "The World," a BBC/PRI radio program. He is in Iraq now through December 30 covering the election.

DINA RIZK KHOURY
Dina Khoury is associate professor of history and international affairs at George Washington University and author of State and Provincial Society in the Ottoman Empire: Mosul, 1540–1834 (1997). Her research interests include the political culture of urban populations in the early modern Middle East and urban rebellions. She commented today: "Important sections of the Iraqi Sunni opposition are coalescing around more clearly defined agendas on how to resist occupation and how to work within post-election Iraq. Sunni leader Adnan al-Dulayami's statement that the resistance is willing to suspend violent operations during the elections is indicative of the willingness of the Sunni opposition to partake in the political process despite its shortcomings."

THABIT A.J. ABDULLAH
Thabit Abdullah is associate professor of history at York University, Toronto. His publications include A Short History of Iraq (Pearson-Longman, 2003). Abdullah has traveled to Iraq to work on development projects and a possible new university in Baghdad. He was in Amman recently meeting with Iraqi journalists and will be voting in this election. He said today: "While this election is undoubtedly an event which will be celebrated in Iraq as another step in the direction of democratic change, it is still compromised by two problems: 1) the deeply flawed Iraqi constitution; and 2) a degree of social chaos that has allowed emerging militias and the US military to influence its outcome."

ISAM AL-KHAFAJI
Isam al-Khafaji, a contributing editor of Middle East Report , teaches at the University of Amsterdam and is the author of Tormented Births: Passages to Modernity in Europe and the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2004). He is also director of Iraq Revenue Watch. In 2002, al-Khafaji participated in the State Department "Future of Iraq" workshops -- 18 in total -- including the "the mother of all workshops," entitled "Transition to Democracy."

JOOST HILTERMANN
Joost Hiltermann is Middle East Project Director at the Crisis Group (www.crisisgroup.org), which conducts research and writes policy-focused reports on armed conflict. Hiltermann is an expert on Iraq and the Kurds. See Crisis Group reports on Iraq here: http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=2436&l=1 .

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