Baghdad Report: It's Safer

The current situation in Baghdad is so much improved that I speculate the mainstream media will view this report as radioactive. From Deborah Haynes in Baghdad for TimesOnline:

Smoking hookah pipes and drinking beer, Sarmad Ali joked and gossiped long into the night with a group of friends in Baghdad -- a luxury they could not enjoy a few months ago because of the violence.

Slightly tipsy, the young men piled into a minibus and drove to Palestine Street, until recently a no-go area after dark but now filled with traffic and pedestrians. They pulled up outside a recently opened late-night restaurant, which serves sheep’s head on bread, a favourite dish for Iraqi men after a few drinks.

Such hangouts, called pacha restaurants, closed after the 2003 invasion because people were too scared to go out late in the evening. "We were surprised to see a pacha restaurant open again," said Mr Ali, a 28-year-old contractor. "It is a clear sign that things are getting back to normal."

Bloodshed in Iraq, still high by most standards, has dropped significantly since August thanks to the impact of a joint US-Iraqi security plan that has resulted in a huge rise in the number of American and Iraqi forces on the streets. The boom of a car bomb, mortar attack or roadside blast is noticeably less frequent.

In a nutshell, things are much more accommodating in Baghdad.