by Marc BurleighTue Nov 21, 11:54 AM ET
The United States is preparing to apply a "new set of ideas" to rebuilding Iraq over the next two months as it seeks to overcome problems ranging from widespread violence to corruption, a senior US official involved in the effort said.
"We're clearly confronted with a series of challenges," the US Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, Stuart Bowen, told reporters on a Paris stopover from Baghdad to Washington.
He said the recent elections handing the US Congress to the Democrats, an upcoming report by an Iraq Study Group headed by former secretary of state James Baker and revised advice to US President George W. Bush from his National Security Council meant many changes were on the way.
Bowen, who oversees and accounts for the 21-billion-dollar (16.4-billion-euro) reconstruction effort in Iraq, declined to say whether any new strategies could pull Iraq out of its worsening spiral of strife.
But he did detail several areas where attention was urgently needed, including establishing the rule of law and encouraging elections to give disenfranchised Sunnis a voice in the tottering democractic process.
The year-long transition period of taking reconstruction away from US auspices and putting it under multinational responsibility was "nearly complete," as affirmed in his group's latest report issued last month.
But the chronic violence in Iraq was far from being stemmed and was hobbling rebuilding efforts.
"The deteriorating security inhibits of course all progress, particularly in Baghdad," he said.
The Iraqi interior and defence ministries "both have a long way to go before they are ready to operate independently," Bowen said.
The soldiers and police they command were not operationally ready to take over from US-led troops, and the ministries remained incapable of managing the total six billion dollars annually needed to run both forces, he explained.
In addition, recent attacks on power lines south of Baghdad have cut average electricity supplies to the capital to around four hours, half the national average, he said.
Sabotage of an oil pipe line to Turkey meant trucks were the only means of transporting Iraq's chief resource -- and they were being targeted by insurgents.
Corruption was prevalent, said Bowen, who also pointed to a hoard of 3.5 billion dollars in the oil ministry's coffers as a problem.
"It appears by the end of this year, Iraq will have perhaps around 6-8 billion dollars in unspent funds," he said, labelling it a "concern" for international donors looking for reassurance that money given will be spent properly.
The rare bright spots in Iraq was the relatively smooth running of the autonomous Kurdish region in the north, and the success of US military sponsored reconstruction initiatives compared to many ill-advised projects started by private contractors.
Bowen, who has made 14 trips to Iraq since being named to his post in 2004, spent a few days in France talking to military commanders here about lessons learnt from Iraq's post-conflict reconstruction experience.
Among those was the need to have a civilian reserve corps ready to deploy to such zones -- avoiding the "piecemeal approach" often adopted by the US authorities in Iraq -- and to ensure that people deployed stayed for fixed terms to avoid gaps opening up in acquired experience, he said.
Bowen said his group -- which the US Senate last week voted to keep operating until late 2008 -- would next year concentrate on reconstruction projects completed more than six months ago when US-appointed administrators were in charge.
The first question to be looked at for each project, he said, will be: "Is it operating?"