20 May 2003
Rumsfeld Says Iraqi Reconstruction Continues Despite Challenges
(Defense Department Report) (600) Washington -- There are problems and challenges in rebuilding post-war Iraq, but there is also ample evidence that conditions are improving, says U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. "Each day the conditions in Iraq are improving, and life is slowly beginning to return to what one might call the normal prewar standard," Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon news media briefing May 20. "There are difficulties, to be sure, but that difficulties exist should not come as a surprise to anyone. No nation [that] has made the transition from tyranny to a civil society -- has been immune to the difficulties and challenges of taking that path." Rumsfeld cited some examples of the progress being made, which include: -- 65 percent of Baghdad's school-age youths have returned to school; -- UNICEF is distributing "school in a box" kits to Basra, Umm Qasr, Safwan and Nasiriyah. Each kit contains enough supplies for one student at each school for a year; -- A committee of Iraqi Shi'ites, Sunnis and other interested groups are being organized to revise the curriculum in public schools; -- Passenger rail service between Baghdad and Basra has resumed, and regular rail service has been restored between Baghdad and Mosul, and between Baghdad and Umm Qasr; -- A new mayor of Kirkuk will be sworn in May 27, and a new town council has been organized with the help of the coalition; -- In Mosul, residents held their first municipal election; a mayor and 23 delegates to the town council were chosen from among more than 200 candidates; -- In Baghdad, local courts have been restored, and U.S. soldiers have been asked to testify in some looting cases; -- Civil servants are returning to work, and some 900,000 of these employees have been provided emergency salary payments; -- The U.S. Agency for International Development's (USAID) reconstruction team reports that residential electric customers in the north and the south have better service today than at any time in the past 12 years; -- A team of Iraqi plumbers have begun repairing leaking pipes throughout Basra, where they had fallen into disrepair; -- In Kirkuk, 13 of 16 primary health care centers and 46 of 56 health care facilities are operational once again; -- The Oil-for-Food distribution system has been restored in Umm Qasr, and the coalition is working to reactivate the program in other parts of the country; -- In Baghdad, 4,500 Iraqi police are now on duty, and in Diwaniyah 277 have returned to duty; -- There is growing evidence that the theft at the national museum was probably "an inside job," and it is currently estimated that only 38 items are confirmed as missing. Air Force General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at the Pentagon briefing that U.S. and coalition forces are continuing to engage in a broad range of security and stability operations as humanitarian operations expand throughout the country. "We currently have some 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq," he said. "Approximately one-third of those forces are in and around the greater Baghdad area." Myers said coalition forces also continue to discover pockets of resistance from paramilitary forces and Ba'ath Party officials. "Additionally, our forces conduct as many as 1,000 separate patrols daily, as well as provide protection to several hundred fixed sites that include internal power, water, fuel, hospitals and food sites," Myers said. "We also guard some prisons, evaluate potential WMD [weapons of mass destruction] sites and protect cultural sites from looting." (Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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