Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for The Independent, discusses the greatly diminished news coverage of Iraq, the al-Maliki regime's authoritarian behavior, the fate of Iraq's ethnic and religious minorities and indications that Iraq's national culture — if not the country itself — is dying.

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for The Independent, discusses the emphatically relative phrase 'Baghdad is better,' imminent U.S. withdraw from Iraqi cities, former Sunni insurgents — gone mainstream — that can’t go back again, the status of Kurdish post-invasion land grabs and the awarding of Iraqi oil contracts to foreign corporations.

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for The Independent, discusses the duplication of (illusory) successful U.S. strategies in Iraq for use in Afghanistan, the U.S. drone missile strikes that kill a few Taliban but anger millions of Pakistanis, Nouri al-Maliki's continued assertion of Iraqi sovereignty and how the Iraqi Sunnis are squeezed between contradictory political pressures from Islamic radicals and the Iraqi government.

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for the Independent, discusses preliminary results from the Iraqi elections, the strong performance of nationalist and secular parties compared to religious parties, the whereabouts of Muqtada al-Sadr and the role his militia and political factions will play in Iraq's future, the patronage system developed between Nouri al-Maliki's Dawa party and tribal councils that contributed to their electoral success and the near-certainty that U.S. occupation...

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for The Independent, discusses the enforcement power of Iraq’s Status of Forces Agreement in light of comments by General Ray Odierno, the influence Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani still has over the major decisions on Iraq’s future, the disappearance of Iraq as a media topic since the 'successful surge' narrative became definitive, the instability in Kurdistan, how the U.S. inadvertently aided Iran’s rise as a regional power and the perils of not learning...

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondant for the Independent, discusses the Iraqi National Intelligence Service threat to sue Ahmed Chalabi, the myth that the 'surge' pacified Iraq, the continued scarcity of clean water and electricity in Baghdad, a likely new UN resolution by the new year and how a Shia-dominated government may be strong enough to take over from the U.S.

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for the Independent, discusses the slightly less violent, yet still horrific, conditions in Iraq, the fear and violence that dominates daily life there, the various factions influencing Maliki, the Sunni 'Awakening' movement and the volatile tensions in Kurdistan. MP3 Here.

Patrick Cockburn discusses his recent articles about how the U.S. is blackmailing Iraq to submit to permanent enslavement with 58 military bases and U.S. soldier immunity, how the Iranian influenced factions will respond to this treaty, Iraq's history of foreign occupation by the British eighty years ago, the sectarian destabilization caused by all occupations, the free-flow of arms in Iraq caused not by the Iranian government but by free-market economics, and the inevitable blowback from...

Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for the Independent and author of Muqtada: Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia revival and the Struggle for Iraq, discusses the past, present, future and importance of the Sadrist movement in Iraq, America’s employment of 'al Qaeda in Iraq,' and the disaster of the occupation.