Violence Impedes Auditors in Iraq

The projects represented only a small portion of the money that has been spent in Iraq -- some $3.5 million compared to well over $20 billion since 2003. Auditors think the projects were handled pretty well but just couldn't prove it.

A series of four reports were issued Tuesday, the third day in less than a week on which assessments were issued by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction Stuart Bowen Jr. The reports said:

--Insurgent activity kept auditors from visiting a $1.7 million project to rehabilitate and upgrade a drinking water treatment plant for residents of Mosul.

--Insurgent activity in the Mosul area over two weeks that the auditors were there forced them to first delay and then cut short a visit to the $237,000 repair of a water pumping station in Bartilla.

There was no electricity and so the pump was not operating while the team was there. Because the team couldn't communicate with the two Iraqis at the station, it couldn't determine why it wasn't working, nor whether they were following good practices in keeping the station maintained since it was handed over to Iraqi control.

--Review of a $147,000 project to build six new municipal road segments in the town of Bartilla in Ninewa found "fully functioning roads" replaced dirt roads and that the project was adequately designed and the U.S. government adequately managed it.

--A $1.4 million project to build a new 6.84-mile asphalt road in Ninewa replaced an impassable road and now "contributes to economic activity," safe pedestrian travel and better response by emergency service.

All four projects hired local companies and all were paid for through the so-called Commander's Emergency Response Program funds, which local commanders can hand out quickly for local projects they deem important.

A report Monday found that the State Department so badly managed a $1.2 billion contract for Iraqi police training that it can't tell what it got for the money spent.

In a report last week, Bowen partly blamed security for limited progress by provincial reconstruction teams (PRTs) -- groups sent to mentor Iraqis in towns and provinces to help them learn how to govern and provide citizens with services.

"In many locations, the PRT program in Iraq is making incremental progress in developing the nation's provincial and local government capacity ... despite" continuing violence and strife, the report said. "However, Iraq's complex and overlapping sectarian, political and ethnic conflicts, as well as the difficult security situation continue to hinder progress in promoting economic development, the rule of law and political reconciliation," it said.