Iraq ignores US technology for mobile phone license awards

IRAQ’S US-led government awarded licenses yesterday for firms to set up mobile phone networks, rebuffing calls by some American lawmakers to use US-backed technology to restore shattered communications.

Iraqi Communications Minister Haidar al-Ebadi said Iraq’s three regional networks would use the GSM system, already adopted across the Middle East. US-backed technology is based on the CDMA system.

The licenses are among the most potentially lucrative and high-profile contracts to be offered in post-war Iraq. A functioning national phone system, which Iraq has lacked since Saddam Hussein was toppled in April, could also allow guerrillas fighting the American-led occupation of Iraq to organise themselves better on a national level, although the US Army says guerrilla groups are only locally organised at present.