Tales of the Reconstruction

According to the BBC Iraq reconstruction 'not working'

Even flagship projects like Baghdad airport are not functioning properly

Six out of eight Iraqi reconstruction projects hailed as successes by the US government are in fact failures, a US federal investigation has found.

The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (Sigir) examined works including a hospital, a barracks and Baghdad international airport.

Blaming ongoing unrest and spiralling corruption they said most were falling apart within as little as six months.

Faulty plumbing and wiring and looting have reportedly worsened the situation.

Corruption amongst Iraqi officials is cited as one of the main causes for the chaos.

According to the report $5bn is lost annually to the fraud and abuse which "afflicts virtually every Iraqi ministry", particularly the oil, interior and defence ministries.

Rise in violence

It also said that the continuing violence gripping Iraq was severely jeopardising the building and maintaining of facilities.

The US defence department says there are on average 1.4 attacks on critical electricity, water, oil and gas facilities each week.

And in addition "repair teams sent in after attacks continue to face threats, including kidnapping and murder," the Sigir report says.

- In a separate development, an annual state department report on global terrorism said that 45% of terror attacks around the world in 2006 took place in Iraq.

- The report said that worldwide there were 14,338 attacks, not including attacks on US troops in Iraq, a rise of 29% on the previous year.

- Five US soldiers were killed in Iraq at the weekend, the military says, making April one of the deadliest months since 2003 with over 100 US military deaths.