New Iraq contracts to be awarded this week

The US office managing rebuilding funds in Iraq will start awarding five billion dollars worth of contracts this week, a senior US official said Sunday, to firms from countries that supported the war effort.
"We anticipate that the first of those will probably be awarded sometime this week. Most likely is that the first of the contracts are going to be the programme management contracts," the official told reporters in Baghdad.
Congress has earmarked 18.4 billion dollars for reconstruction in Iraq, almost one third of the 55 billion dollars the World Bank estimates will be necessary to get the war-torn country back on its feet.
But Washington infuriated many countries when it announced last year that primary rebuilding contracts in Iraq would exclude critics of the war such as France and Germany.
However the official said firms from countries that appear on a US list of favoured nations were free to subcontract to whomever they wanted.
"They can subcontract to companies from countries that are not on the list," he said.
The official said the Program Management Office (PMO) would award the five billion dollars in contracts this month. Most would be construction contracts but he said it was important to have the management contracts start early.
"That will of course help those contractors be able to start getting in place and getting organised, to give them a little step ahead of the construction contractors," he said.
The 18.4 billion dollar Iraq fund is destined for 2,363 projects and was unveiled with much fanfare by Washington in October but Iraqis say it has had little real impact as unemployment remains high and living standards low.
Two separate deals worth one billion dollars have already been awarded to the US Army Corps of Engineers to rebuild Iraq's oil sector as part of a 12.4 billion dollar US package earmarked for construction.
A further six billion dollars is being spent on non-construction schemes that are open to bids from all countries regardless of their war views, according to the PMO.
The fund will be managed by the Pentagon at least until June 30, when the US-led coalition is due to transfer sovereignty to an as-yet undetermined Iraqi authority.