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| US, former Iraqi officials discuss restoration of vital services |
| CCTV.COM 2003-04-28 10:04:27 |
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US administrators in Iraq met former Baghdad officials on Sunday to orchestrate the restoration of vital services to the battered city, essential if the Americans are to cub mounting resentment among the population.
Barbara Bodine, the coordinator under US general Jay Garner, met with Iraqi municipality officials in an effort to return normality to the Iraqi capital following the US－led war on Iraq. Both sides discussed basic, but pressing issues in the Iraqi capital, such as garbage collection, trash removal, as well as the supply of water and electricity.
Bodine also announced a second round of meetings to discuss an "emerging leadership" in Iraq. She said the Baghdad session would be more broad－based than the previous meeting held on April 15 in the southern city of Ur. She added that between 300 and 400 representatives are expected to attend the all－day meeting.
Meanwhile, the US military said unknown attackers fired an incendiary device into an Iraqi munitions dump in Zaafaraniya, on the capital's southern outskirts. But local residents have turned their anger over the resulting deaths on American forces.
Anti－US protests broke out later in Baghdad and the incident seemed sure to fuel mounting opposition to a continued US military occupation of Iraq.
During an interview on US－based "Fox News Sunday," Iraqi opposition leader Ahmad Chalabi claimed that evidence from Iraqi secret police files showed Saddam Hussein himself had requested a special explosive belt of the kind used by suicide bombers.
Chalabi, widely known as the Pentagon's choice to lead the post－Saddam Iraq, was asked whether French, German and Russian companies would be welcomed back into a post－Saddam Iraq. He said Iraq should be open to competition for contracts by all international firms but be believed the gratitude that the Iraqi people felt for the US would give them "preference and priority" in various fields of economic cooperation.
So far all construction contracts for work in Iraq issued by the US government have gone to American firms.
Until a few weeks ago Chalabi had not set foot in Iraq since leaving the country as a teenager in 1958. He has been living in Washington where he headed an Iraqi opposition group.
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Editor: Yang Feiyang CCTV.com
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