Report on Iraq Security Lists 310 Contractors
By joshuah at 29 October, 2008, 6:44 am
Source: NYTimes.com
At least 310 private security companies from around the world have received contracts from United States agencies to protect American and Iraqi officials, installations, convoys and other entities in Iraq since 2003, according to the most comprehensive accounting yet of the secretive and weakly regulated role that private firms have played in the conflict.A report by a federal oversight agency detailing the roster of security companies has been circulated among members of Congress and some federal agencies, and was obtained last week by The New York Times. The list, more extensive than any that had previously been disclosed, contains some familiar American companies, like Blackwater and DynCorp, but also hundreds of obscure firms from places as far-flung as Uganda, the Philippines, Cyprus, Romania and the Czech Republic.
The roster includes an American company, Agility Logistics, whose name has surfaced in a federal inquiry into improper pricing in Iraq. The company has denied wrongdoing.
Another firm, Custer Battles, was eventually barred from receiving Defense Department contracts after allegations of malfeasance.
Also on the list is a German firm, Toifor, that is better known for providing bases in Iraq with portable latrines than with security.
The Web site of another American firm on the list, Paratus Worldwide Protection, includes a blog by one of its security officers in Iraq that has entries that appear to be insensitive and potentially offensive to Muslims, as well as highly explicit photos of maimed Iraqi security contractors who apparently worked for the company.
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The new report shows that there are far more companies to track than previously known, with backgrounds that are far more varied than earlier disclosures had suggested. And research by the federal investigators indicates that more than five years into the conflict, there is still no central database to account for all the security companies in Iraq financed by American money.
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Because all of the databases are incomplete, estimates of the number of security companies and the money spent on their contracts are likely to grow, the report indicates.
None of the handful of companies contacted by The Times denied having received security contracts in Iraq.David Westrate, a senior vice president at MVM Inc., an American security company ranked 16th in terms of the amount of money it had been paid to provide security in Iraq — about $38 million on 21 separate Pentagon contracts — said, “We cannot confirm the numbers as you’ve given them to us, but I’m not surprised that we’re in the top 20.”
Perhaps the most eye-opening aspect of the list is the variety in the types of companies listed. Agility Logistics, formerly called Public Warehousing Company, is widely known as a colossus in the business of delivering food and other supplies to troops in Iraq.
…On Tuesday, a spokesman for the company said that he could not confirm the figures, but that the contracts had probably been won by a wholly owned subsidiary, Threat Management Group, that specializes in security, rather than by Agility.
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