Iraqi officials have whittled down the number of air frieght forwarders working in the country from 27 to seven, according to several sources.
Among those told to consider Iraq as a “no fly zone” from now on is Russian arms trafficker Victor Bout, one source said.
The Los Angeles Times reported Dec. 14, 2004, that Bout was then affiliated with several air carriers providing services to FedEx, KBR and other U.S. funded contractors despite being blacklisted by U.S. authorities. Then again, the blacklist didn’t carry the kind of punch at the Pentagon that some might expect, The Los Angeles Times reported last year:

Planes linked to Bout’s shadowy network continued to fly into Iraq, according to government records and interviews with officials, despite the Treasury Department freezing his assets in July and placing him on a blacklist for allegedly violating international arms sanctions.
Largely under the auspices of the Pentagon, U.S. agencies including the Army Corps of Engineers and the Air Force, and the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority, which governed Iraq until last summer, have allowed their private contractors to do business with the Bout network.

Maybe the Iraqis are doing what the Pentagon apparently declined to do (credit that to the Defense Department’s usual “wartime exigencies” spiel, I am sure). Then again, Bout is a creative guy. He pops up in all sorts of disguises, corporate and otherwise.
As for those seven air carriers that continue doing work in Iraq, “business is growing very, very fast,” my source said.