MP calls for putting private security companies to trials

Baghdad (NINA) - MP from State of Law Coalition, Abdul Salam Al Maliki, called for departing private security companies with the departure of U.S. troops from Iraq by end of 2011.


He said in a statement to NINA on Sunday "the private security companies should be subject to legal accountability for their crimes committed and atrocities against the Iraqi people, including the Blackwater security company for killing 17 civilians in the incident of Nisour Sq.


Maliki added "security companies are not accepted in the Iraqi street, Blackwater or other, these companies came to Iraq for the purpose of material benefit and profit-making, they carry out bad agenda of their own."

The Blackwater name in emerged in the local and world media after the elements of the U.S. security company working in Iraq opened fire on a number of Iraqi civilians in 2007 in the Nisour Sq. in Baghdad, killing 17 of them.


The incident caused tensions in Iraq's relations with the United States and raised the issue of private security companies operating in war zones.