[A-List] Judge Halts Award Of Iraq Paramilitary Contract

["Leigh Meyers" <the.buffalo.in.the.midst@xxxxxxxxx>]

Judge Halts Award Of Iraq Contract
By Alec Klein and Steve Fainaru - Washington Post
Jun/04/2007

A federal judge yesterday ordered the military to temporarily refrain
from awarding the largest security contract in Iraq. The order
followed an unusual series of events set off when a U.S. Army veteran
filed a protest against the government practice of hiring what he
calls mercenaries, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The contract, worth about $475 million, calls for a private company to
provide intelligence services to the U.S. Army and security for the
Army Corps of Engineers on reconstruction work in Iraq. The case,
which is being heard by the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, puts on
trial one of the most controversial and least understood aspects of
the Iraq war: the outsourcing of military security to an estimated
20,000 armed contractors who operate with little oversight.

Brian X. Scott, a 53-year-old Colorado man, filed the complaint in
early April. He argues that the military's use of private security
contractors is "against America's core values" and violates an 1893
law that prohibits the government from hiring quasi-military forces.

In Full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/01/AR2007060102261.html