Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs — What’s a few billion missing between friends?

WASHINGTON – The US-run administration in Baghdad failed to keep track of nearly US$9 billion of money it transferred to various Iraqi ministries, according to an official audit released Sunday.

The report by the US Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction says that the now defunct US-lead Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) did not exercise adequate managerial control over funds paid to Iraqi government ministries, which employ hundreds of experts from the US. This resulted in potentially widespread corruption, including paying salaries to “ghost” employees, and led to the eventual disappearance of $8.8 billion between early 2003 and mid-2004.

The CPA was phased out last July to make way for the interim Iraqi government, which will be replaced by an elected body later this year. The report said that although the CPA published reports on the Internet of total disbursements to the Iraqi ministries, it failed to specify what the funds were used for.