US to open huge embassy in Iraq.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
US to open huge embassy in Iraq.
4
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 12:27pm

The dissolution of the Coalition Provisional Authority at the end of June will not mean the end of the US presence in Iraq - far from it.

The beginning of July will see the official launch of the US embassy in Baghdad, which many are describing at the largest US diplomatic mission in the world.






Ambassador John Negroponte
Negroponte is leaving the UN to take up the Baghdad post
It will have a staff of 1,700 - roughly 1,000 Americans and 700 Iraqis - and be responsible for disbursing $18bn in US aid to Iraq.

The embassy itself will have an operating budget of up to $1bn in fiscal year 2005 alone, the US State Department estimates.

And that does not include the cost of constructing the embassy building itself.

John Negroponte, who has been the US Ambassador to the United Nations for the past two-and-a-half years, is to be the new ambassador to Iraq.

He will "provide policy direction and coordination for all US government activities in Iraq" except for military ones, he told the Senate.

Speedy confirmation

The US Senate - which must approve the president's ambassadorial nominations - confirmed him in record time, holding his confirmation hearing just eight days after he was nominated and approving him soon after.

Mr Negroponte arrives in Baghdad at the beginning of July, but his deputy - Deputy Chief of Mission Jim Jeffrey - has been in place since the middle of May.

Mr Jeffrey had been US Ambassador to Albania.

The State Department had also assigned more than 120 staff to the embassy by mid-May and begun interviewing Iraqis for local-hire positions.

More than 600 CPA staff will stay in place at least temporarily after 1 July as part of the new embassy.

Range of functions

Embassy staff will be responsible for a huge range of tasks, including human rights monitoring.






Interim Iraqi President Ghazi Yawer
Yawer disputes the US claim to the Republican Palace
Eleven US government departments - other than State - had told Secretary of State Colin Powell as of mid-May that they wanted to have personnel at the embassy.

The US Justice Department, for example, is seconding a team to the embassy to advise and assist the Iraqi war crimes tribunal.

American diplomats in Baghdad will be very heavily guarded.

There were already 30 diplomatic security agents in Baghdad when the Senate held Mr Negroponte's confirmation hearing at the end of April, and he estimated that the number would rise to at least 50.

Some of the existing private security companies working for the Coalition Provisional Authority would probably be kept on, he added.

The embassy complex itself will be within the heavily-fortified Green Zone - a site chosen for security reasons.


More............... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3813267.stm

cl-Libraone~

 


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iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 12:39pm
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I wonder what the Iraqi's think about this. It would seem that America plans to maintain control, mainly of the oil. Our intentions may only be hidden from the view of Americans.

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This is acceptable?

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2003
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 4:22pm
>>I wonder what the Iraqi's think about this.<<

From what I read last week, they don't at all like it. Meet the new boss... same as the old boss...

Another incredibly stupid decision. Just when it seems impossible they can come up with more, they do.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Mon, 06-28-2004 - 10:26am
Bush doesn't have the capacity to see his actions from the Iraqi's POV, nor does he care.

Of course the Iraqis don't like the US as occupiers. This is all they have known, so they understand very clearly what's going on. The embassy is not a "regular" embassy, it is a control center. Only the Americans don't understand this, some don't even know about it.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2003
Mon, 06-28-2004 - 10:58am
What grates is the audacity of it all... they never take into account how others feel... in this case the Iraqi people... build our own embassy, let them take that place and do with it what they wish.