Fury in Iraq at US spying claims..

Iraq is demanding an explanation from the United States after allegations that US intelligence agencies have been spying on Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister and other government officials.

If the claims, made in a new book by veteran investigative reporter Bob Woodward, prove to be true they will “cast a shadow” over relations between Baghdad and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and other US intelligence services, an Iraqi government spokesman said yesterday.

“If it is true, if it is a fact, it reflects that there is no trust and it reflects also that the institutions in the United States are used to spy on their friends and their enemies in the same way,” Dr Ali al-Dabbagh told The Times.

“If it is true it casts a shadow on the future relations with such institutions,” he said. “We will raise this with the American side and we will ask for an explanation.”
.
The book, due to be published on Monday, also claims that a “surge” last year of almost 30,000 additional US troops into Baghdad and the surrounding area was not the primary reason behind a drop in the violence in recent months.
Instead, it alludes to “groundbreaking” new covert techniques that enabled US military and intelligence officials to pinpoint and kill key insurgent leaders, including senior members of al-Qaeda in Iraq. It declines to give more details, however, to avoid revealing state secrets.

Mr Woodward's book, his fourth on President Bush's handling of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, portrays the rifts that plagued the Bush Administration as the troop surge policy was devised against a backdrop of escalating bloodshed.
He writes that top generals staged a “near revolt” in late 2006, fearing that their advice was not reaching the President.
General David Petraeus, the current top military commander in Iraq, is portrayed in a positive light. However, as the man who implemented Mr Bush's new policy on the ground, his predecessor, General George Casey, is seen as falling out of favour with the President.

The Times