[Winstonm]

As the NYT put it:

Quote

  As the scope of Mr. (Peter) Galbraith’s financial interests in Kurdistan become clear, they have the potential to inflame some of Iraqis’ deepest fears, including conspiracy theories that the true reason for the American invasion of their country was to take its oil. It may not help that outside Kurdistan, Mr. Galbraith’s influential view that Iraq should be broken up along ethnic lines is considered offensive to many Iraqis’ nationalism. Mr. Biden and Mr. Kerry, who have been influenced by Mr. Galbraith’s thinking but do not advocate such a partitioning of the country, were not aware of Mr. Galbraith’s oil dealings in Iraq, aides to both politicians say.

    Some officials say that his financial ties could raise serious questions about the integrity of the constitutional negotiations themselves. "The idea that an oil company was participating in the drafting of the Iraqi Constitution leaves me speechless," said Feisal Amin al-Istrabadi, a principal drafter of the law that governed Iraq after the United States ceded control to an Iraqi government on June 28, 2004.

    In effect, he said, the company "has a representative in the room, drafting."

The Democratic pro-war hawk who supported and lobbied for the invasion of Iraq and who helped write the Iraqui Constitution after the fall of Sadam, has failed ever to mention his ties to a company that within weeks of the invasion purchased oil rights from the Kurds that are estimated to be worth personally to Mr. Galbraith $100 million.

However, Norwegian investigative reporters have uncovered the story and now the NYT's has also contributed additional details.

[Winstonm]

Update #1:

Quote

The New York Times is forced to publish an Editor's Note today in light of this story, noting that "Mr. Galbraith signed a contract that obligated him to disclose his financial interests in the subjects of his articles"; he "should have disclosed to readers that Mr. Galbraith could benefit financially" from the policies he was advocating in his Op-Eds; and "had editors been aware of Mr. Galbraith's financial stake, the Op-Ed page would have insisted on disclosure or not published his articles."

[PassedOut]

This is not a shining moment for the US, that's for sure. The current Iraq constitution, written under occupation, has only temporary effect. The Iraqis will rearrange matters to suit themselves when the occupation ends.

[Al_U_Card]

Did not the Ottoman empire maintain autonomous regions throughout the area? (I realize that they massacred Kurds and Armenians during brutal repressions of nationalist movements.)

The Brits, after the Balfour declaration, started the states that still exist...for now.