Baghdad 'to host' film festival

Baghdad is to host an international movie festival, according to the news federal agency Agence France-Presse.

Iraqi movie manager Dr Abdul Basit Salman said it will be the first major cinematic event in the war-ravaged working capital in more than than two years.

Movies will be submitted from Egypt, Jordan River and Iran, the federal agency said.

The three-day event, which is being staged by the Association of Iraki Filmmakers Without Borders, will run from 16 December.

Economic sanctions

The Al-Mansour hotel, which hosted a festival of short movies in 2005, have been ruled out of being a possible venue.

It's after 12 people were killed in the hotel anteroom in June after a self-destruction bomber attacked a meeting of tribal leaders.

Iraq's movie industry days of the month back to the 1940s with households attending films on a weekly footing in the 70s and 80s.

However the 1991 Gulf warfare and the economical countenances that followed it saw theaters going into decline.

Cinemas were burned and attacked after the 2003 conflict.