Summaries here and here and here.

Chaos abides.

The little-known city of Baquba is emerging as one of the hotbeds of resistance in Iraq, with clashes breaking out every day.

The violence in this city 30 mi. northeast of Baghdad is also now spreading elsewhere around Diyala province.

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An Iraqi army colonel told reporters in Diyala last week that that U.S. troops had arrested 10 Iraqi soldiers suspected of sectarian killings. There was no official U.S. comment.

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The influence of each group changes often. “Each day I wake up I don’t know who is in control of my city,” said a religious sheik in Baquba who asked to be referred to as Sheik Ahmed. “One day it is the Americans, the next day a militia, the next day a resistance group.” Article

Related:

Day-to-day life here for Iraqis is so far removed from the comfortable existence we live in the United States that it is almost literally unimaginable.

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Imagine the worst day you’ve ever had in your life, add a regular dose of terror and you’ll begin to get an idea of what it’s like every day for a lot of people here. Article

More follow-up on the mass food poisoning incident in the south.

In other developments, the head of a hospital that treated police officers who fell ill after a Sunday evening meal at their base said spoiled food served at a mess hall was the cause.

Dr. Matheel Alwan, the head of Kut General Hospital, said samples of the yogurt and of the hamburgers served at the police base in Numaniyah had been sent to Baghdad to see which of them were contaminated. “It was either spoiled hamburger, or spoiled yogurt,” he said.

Kut hospital admitted 53 of the estimated 350 to 400 policemen for treatment, and pumped the stomachs and immediately released many others, Alwan said. They were suffering from severe vomiting with traces of blood, dehydration and diarrhea - typical symptoms of food poisoning, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The final policeman treated was discharged Tuesday, Alwan said. Article

Short of massive changes in the security and infrastructure segments (accompanied by massive indigenous monetary backing and tax and fee waivers), any agrrements on Iraqi oil (remember that?) won’t come to fruition for literally years, if then. International oil concerns will remain skittish (though less so involving the Kurdish north unless the situation in Kirkuk and Mosul should totally erupt), being cognizant of the effects and costs of the much less widespread instability in Nigeria, for example (see Noted In Passing, below).

“I see very strong interest from U.S. energy companies in Iraq,” Ambassador Samir Shakir Mahmood Sumaida’ie told Dow Jones Newswires after a speech in Houston.

The companies “have visited me at the embassy and expressed that interest,” while “waiting for things to be put in place,” he said.

The passage of a new investment law in the next two or three weeks and a new hydrocarbons law “within this year” will create the right conditions for major U.S. investments, he said.

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In the speech Monday, which was hosted by the Bilateral U.S.-Arab Chamber of Commerce, Sumaida’ie advised oil executives to “get a foot in the door” in the areas that are currently safe, and “work your way outward.” Article