AP: Iraq's best chance to boost its languishing oil output is by working with major international companies under production-sharing agreements, Iraq's deputy prime minister said on Sunday. Barham Saleh said Iraqi leaders were nearing agreement on a long-awaited hydrocarbon law that would allow potentially huge investments by foreign companies in Iraq's oil sector. He was hopeful that oil would be a "unifying force," but conceded that wrangling continued over whether it would be controlled locally or by the central government. Saleh said he expected the law setting ground rules for managing Iraq's huge petroleum reserves to be approved in parliament by year's end. [...]

AP: Iraq's prime minister announced plans to visit Iran on Monday, just days after his deputy returned from the country, accompanied by several top officials. [...]

Reuters: Iraq's prime minister plans to reshuffle his cabinet just 100 days after it was formed because of frustrations with some ministers' performance and disloyalty among others, Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salih told Reuters. In a weekend interview, he said Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki would make the changes soon in an "important signal" of commitment to efficiency in his national unity coalition and to his efforts to rally factions behind a reconciliation plan to avert civil war. Some changes will involve the movement of radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, several political sources said on Sunday. A key player in the government formed in May after months of wrangling, Sadr denies his Mehdi Army militia runs some of the sectarian death squads behind much recent violence. "There will be a government reshuffle. There will be some changes in a number of cabinet portfolios," Salih, the most senior Kurdish official in the cabinet, said. "It's only natural for the prime minister and the political leadership to contemplate reshuffling and changing to improve the ability of the government," he added. [...]

AP: Hundreds of Iraqi tribal chiefs gave important support Saturday to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's national reconciliation plan, while the government leader called the release of a leading Sunni Arab lawmaker by kidnappers a gift to his unity campaign. Al-Maliki won endorsement of his program for bridging religious, ethnic and political divisions at a national conference of tribal chiefs. A representative of the chiefs read their agreement on live television, calling it a "pact of honor."

Reuters: Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki urged hundreds of tribal leaders gathered in Baghdad on Saturday to unite to end the bitter sectarian bloodshed between Sunnis and Shi'ites that has raised fears of civil war. "Iraq needs all of its sons during this stage. There is no difference between Sunnis and Shi'ites," he told the meeting, the first in a series to promote dialogue between the warring sects as part of his national reconciliation programme. "Yes, we differ in opinion and that's a healthy sign but we must hold dialogue to solve our problems," Maliki said. "The liberation of the nation from any foreign hand cannot be without national unity, the unity that our forefathers built during hundreds of years." [...]

Reuters: Iraq has joined forces with the United Nations and the World Bank to tackle corruption and to boost economic development. [...]

Reuters: Iraq is expected to start talks with major [oil] companies in two months to develop its oilfields and some are eager to begin work even before a hydrocarbon law is in place, its oil minister said on Wednesday. [...]

Zaman Daily News (Turkey): Positive developments have begun to occur after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan voiced harsh reactions to the US and Iraqi administrations regarding their stance over the outlawed terrorist organization, Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK). Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said they were serious about the fight against the terror organization and would “immediately” shut down the PKK’s bureau in Bagdat (Baghdad). [...]

Reuters: Iraq's central bank offers a beacon of stability in a country on the brink of civil war, but the governor is still forced to use safe houses for meetings with guests too scared to visit his headquarters downtown.

Washington Post op-ed: Do or Die Against Iraq's Death Squads

Reuters: Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Monday his country will not slide into civil war but acknowledged that mounting sectarian violence is now killing 100 civilians a day.

Iraq status report

Via The Belmont Club, the full transcript of ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad's Iraq status report.

Financial Times (UK): Iraq's national reconciliation initiative has paved the way for government contacts with insurgents and should be seen as only a first step towards a political solution to the conflict, according to Iraq's vice-president. Adel Abdel-Mehdi, senior Shia official and vice-president in the new government, told the Financial Times that other measures would follow the plan unveiled last Sunday and deemed by many analysts to be vague and incomplete. In an interview during a visit to London, Mr Abdel-Mehdi said contacts with insurgents had been going on for some time but the reconciliation plan had now made dialogue an official policy. He also left the door open to a broadening of an am-nesty offer after Nuri al-Maliki, the prime minister, this week insisted it would exclude anyone who had killed American troops or Iraqis. [...]

AP: Analysis: Iraq PM Challenged by Insurgency

IranMania: According to an AFP report, Iran will next month host a conference on security in Iraq gathering representatives from Iraq's neighbours, Egypt, the Arab League and Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said.