The United States Government has spent just 2 per cent of an $18.4 billion aid package that Congress approved last year after the Bush administration called for a quick infusion of cash into Iraq to finance reconstruction, according to figures released Friday by the White House. The US-led occupation authorities were much quicker to channel Iraq’s own money, expending or earmarking nearly all of $20 billion in a special development fund fed by the country’s oil sales, a congressional investigator said. Only $366 million of the $18.4 billion US aid package had been spent as of June 22, the White House budget office told Congress in a report that offers the detailed accounting of the reconstruction package. Thus far, according to the report, nothing from the package has been spent on construction, healthcare, sanitation and water projects. Of $3.2 billion earmarked for security and law enforcement, a key US goal in Iraq, only $194 million has been spent. US officials involved in the reconstruction blame security concerns and bureaucratic infighting between the Pentagon, the State Department and the White House for delays in the allocation of funds. Officials with the contracting office contend the amount of money actually spent does not reflect the full scope of work being performed. A more accurate figure, they said, is the amount of money allocated for reconstruction work. Just over $5.2 billion had been allocated as of June 22, according to the White House budget report. ‘‘The money that is disbursed is typically not disbursed until the work is completed, so it doesn’t give the best picture of what’s going on,’’ said John Proctor, a spokesman for the contracting office. ‘‘Some of our projects take months, or even years, to complete.’’ The Coalition Provisional Authority spent or locked in for future programmes more than $19 billion from the $20 billion Development Fund for Iraq, which was established by the UN Security Council to manage Iraq’s oil revenue, said Joseph A. Christoff, director of international affairs and trade at the General Accounting Office (GAO), the watchdog arm of Congress. Christoff said on Saturday that all but $900 million of the fund had been spent or allocated by the time the US transferred political authority to an interim Iraqi government on last Monday. Some Iraqi officials have criticised the contrasting spending practices. The occupation authorities ‘‘came here and spent a lot of our money but very little of theirs,’’ said a senior Iraqi official. The CPA appears to have earmarked more than $6 billion of the Iraqi funds over the past two months alone. —(LAT-WP)
