At 07:10 03/09/2003 -0700, you wrote:
<<<<
It would be interesting to confirm Keith's assertion that the current volatile condition in Iraq is discouraging any or many US firms from signing contracts. I know that firms were lining up to do business with Halliburton and Bechtel, but would love to know if contracts have been signed and project teams and procurement are under way. Has anyone been following that?
>>>>
Yes, here you are -- something relevant from today's FT. I would guess that even Halliburton and Bechtel must be finding it hard to recruit enough people at the present time (that is, of sufficiently high calibre to be be really useful to their operations). It must be particularly galling to Cheney and Bush Senior. I'm sure they can't be cleaning up financially in quite the way they imagined. In fact, they might be losing money hand over fist. If this is so then Schadenfreude is the appropriate term to use, I think!
How I'd love to be a fly on the wall when the Bush gang meets together. They must be sick in the pit of their stomachs as to what is happening now to their plans.
But celebration is not appropriate. I have just been looking at BBC news tonight and one of their journalists has just been interviewing villagers at Hillel where the Americans (or the brits) dropped cluster bombs. A father tried to protect his children when the cluster bombs came down (we could see all the individual pits in the concrete where they had struck) and he was cut about all over his body but miraculously survived. All his six children were killed however and he showed the journalist the photos one by one of his beautiful children.
I can't forgive Bush nor Blair for all this. Both ought to be charged as war criminals. I would without any scruples kill them both if I had the chance of doing so if enough publicity were given to it. That would be an honourable thing for an old man to do.
Keith
<<<<< IRAQ Donors see US occupation as hindering reconstruction
Judy Dempsey
The reconstruction of Iraq will be entirely different from Bosnia, East Timor or Afghanistan, according to experts who have led humanitarian aid programmes in Iraq and other countries and who today will attend a crucial meeting in Brussels of leading international donors.
"We are dealing with an immensely rich country not just in terms of oil but in terms of culture and people. It is one of the most educated peoples in the Arab world," said Francis Dubois, of the United Nations Development Programme, who headed the UNDP's operations in Iraq until July. "It has had a functioning bureaucracy and infrastructure - though now dilapidated," he added.
But Mr Dubois, who spent four years in Iraq and several years working in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, said that donors were racing against time to have precise "needs assessments" reports ready by the Madrid pledging conference next month.
"Apart from the difficulties of working on the ground, we wanted to involve as many Iraqis as possible on the council, town and village level. That takes a lot of time."
The UNDP will focus on three of the 14 sectors that donors will today discuss. These will include issues such as governance, employment and electricity.
But other experts with long experience in governance and institution- building warned that Iraq's natural advantages for reconstruction could be wasted if the US-led military occupation continued for a long time.
"Ask any donor. Security is now the number one issue," said a leading humanitarian aid agency that requested anonymity. "Reconstruction will be hampered as long as the occupation continues. You can build walls, wire fences and have armed guards. It will not bring security. The violence will continue as long as the occupation continues. That is something the Brussels donors meeting should face up to."
Donors said reconstruction could advance if the US were no longer perceived as an army of occupation and the security situation improved. When Nato-led forces restored security in Bosnia in 1996 and in Kosovo in 1999, the World Bank, the UN and other agencies, all working under strong UN mandates, embarked on rapid reconstruction programmes.
But Gerald Knaus, director of the Berlin-based European Stability Initiative that specialises in institution building, warned "These programmes were very successful but only up to a point." He is sharply critical of the way in which reconstruction in the Balkans has not been followed up by economic development and growth.
"Anyone going into Iraq must learn the lessons from the Balkans. Reconstruction itself will not suffice. You need people to take care of those capital assets, such as water management and bridges. You need to create investment and jobs. You have to empower the people," said Mr Knaus.
Bosnia and Kosovo are under international protectorates headed by the EU and UN. But donors said the UN was against taking any kinds of risks, particularly over privatisation.
Mr Dubois, of the UNDP, yesterday said that if the security climate did improve in Iraq and reconstruction speeded up, "I promise you, there would be no lack of investment given Iraq's rich resources across the board"
Financial Times; Sep 03, 2003 >>>>
Keith Hudson, 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath, England, <www.evolutionary-economics.org>
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