Five years after bombings forced the UN to pull out of Iraq, the world body is back. It announced plans on Wednesday to help Iraq rebuild and create jobs following complaints the government has been unable or unwilling to spend its oil riches.
An agreement signed by the UN and the Iraqi government outlined a series of steps to help the Iraqis improve spending and fund reconstruction, development and humanitarian projects with a budget of US$2.2 billion through 2010.
The ambitious plans came ahead of the fifth anniversary of the Aug. 19, 2003 bombing at the UN’s Baghdad headquarters that killed 22 people, including top UN envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello.
The UN pulled out of Iraq in October 2003 after a second bombing at the organization’s hotel headquarters and a spate of attacks on humanitarian workers.
It maintained a presence with Iraqi employees and allowed 35 international staffers to return in August 2004, but operations were sharply curtailed.
The current UN envoy to Iraq, Staffan di Mistura, said it was time to change that.
“There are moments when we wonder whether all this was worthwhile or not,” he said at a somber memorial ceremony on Wednesday in the US-protected Green Zone. “I can tell you that what we are doing at the moment is sending a signal that the UN is back. The UN is back to stay.”
The UN has had a complicated relationship with Iraq dating back to former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein’s era when it imposed sanctions that crippled the economy after the 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
But it has steadily been raising its profile as security improved, helping organize planned provincial elections and monitoring human rights. Di Mistura’s deputy, David Shearer, said the organization has 140 international staffers around the country.
Officials said the new agreement was “the first of its kind to be adopted in the country since the 1990s.”
The so-called Iraq Assistance Strategy is focused on improving the Iraqi government’s ability to carry out projects, with focus on education, water, sanitation, health and nutrition and humanitarian assistance for internal refugees and other needy groups.
One of the biggest concerns is unemployment, with most jobs in Iraq provided by the central government and a high number of idle young men who could turn back to violence, Shearer said.
The UN estimated that more than 50 percent of Iraqis able to work are unemployed and face difficulties in meeting basic living costs.
“We have to be able to move a lot of the investment to the private sector,” Shearer said at a joint press conference with Iraqi Planning and Development Minister Ali Baban. “Our biggest way of improving security is to make sure that young people are employed.”
But Iraq’s fledgling government institutions are ill-prepared to deal with that and other myriad problems facing the country, he said, adding the main mission of the UN would be to provide know-how.
The government only spent 33.9 percent of its US$2.8 billion capital budget and the ministries were unable to use more than 63 percent of their development funds last year, the UN estimated.
The estimated budget for the UN efforts over the two years was estimated at US$2.2 billion, with US$322 million immediately available. The funding was provided by donor nations, UN contributions and the Iraqi government itself.
It’s part of the International Compact with Iraq, a sweeping five-year economic and political reform package that the UN secretary-general helped broker last year.
“This represents an important step in Iraq’s recovery process,” Baban said. “It brings the whole UN organization together in partnership with Iraq and its people to reduce poverty, foster growth and consolidate democracy in our country.”
MORE BOMBINGS
Meanwhile, four policemen and a young girl were killed in a rash of bombings across Iraq yesterday, security officials said.
A car bomb targeting a police patrol near Baqubah, about 60km north of Baghdad, killed two policemen and injured six, they said.
Also near Baqubah, a bomb hidden in a field killed a 10-year-old girl, a security official said.
In Baghdad, two roadside bombs went off in separate locations, killing one policeman and wounding 17 people, including 14 Shiite pilgrims headed on foot to Karbala for a major religious festival, police said.
The first bomb, in the southeastern district of Zafaraniyah, killed the policeman and wounded nine others — six pilgrims and three policemen, a police official said.
The second blast, in the central Alwiya district, wounded eight pilgrims, all males in their late teens and early 20s, another police official said.
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