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Quadriga

March 14, 2013

Ten years ago the United States together with a "coalition of the willing" brought down the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Instead of the promised democracy the country was initially plunged into violence and chaos. Now, after a period of relative calm, ethnic and religious tensions seem to be on the rise once again.

https://p.dw.com/p/17yD2

Iraqi politics is now dominated by the Shiite majority with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki at the government helm. Members of the Sunni minority feel increasingly disadvantaged and the Kurds in the north feel their autonomy is under threat.

The civil war in neighboring Syria and Iran’s ambitions in the region are also factors heightening tensions within Iraq.




Despite rich oil and gas reserves the majority of Iraqis continue to live in poverty. For foreign investors Iraq is still a high risk proposition.

Tell us what you think: Invasion Anniversary - Iraq's Lost Decade?

Write to us at quadriga@dw.de


Our guests:

Robert Reid - he is Associated Press chief of bureau for Germany, Austria and Switzerland and has been a journalist for nearly 45 years, including about 15 years in the Middle East. During the US-led invasion of Iraq, he was a supervisory editor for the AP based in Doha and then spent the next six years as chief editor for the AP in Iraq. Later, he served as AP News Director for Afghanistan and Pakistan based in Kabul and was AP's chief editor for the Middle East based in Cairo before transferring to Berlin in 2012. He was born in April 1947 and educated at Davidson College in North Carolina. He spent three years in Augsburg as a US Army officer from 1970 until 1973

Sinan Antoon – An Iraqi-born academic, writer and filmmaker. He grew up in Baghdad and moved to the United States in 1991. He gained a doctorate in Arabic literature at Harvard before taking up a teaching role at New York University. In 2010 he was a fellow of the Berlin Institute for Advanced Study, researching the relationship between the Middle East and Europe. Currently he is a visiting fellow at the American Academy in Berlin.

Michael Lüders - he studied Arabic literature in Damascus as well as Islamic studies, political science and publishing in Berlin. His dissertation focused on the Egyptian cinema. His works include documentaries for German public television and a long stint as Middle East correspondent for the “Die Zeit” newspaper. Lüders lives in Berlin, working as a political adviser, publicist and author.