BAGHDAD, April 24: Iraq’s civil US administrator Jay Garner pledged on Thursday to reopen the country’s ministries soon and sounded out prospective local leaders with whom to work on the tough task of rebuilding the Iraqi government.

In an encouraging development for Washington, US-led forces managed to get some oil and gas production restarted, an aide to Mr Garner announced.

And the United Nations Environment Programme called for water and sewerage systems in Iraq to be quickly restored to reduce the risk of epidemics, warning the war-damaged sanitation and electricity systems and worsening pollution posed a health threat.

In Baghdad, Jay Garner, a retired US general tasked with overseeing humanitarian relief and setting up an interim Iraqi government, told a press conference he hoped to get Iraq’s ministries up and running sometime next week, little more than a month after the first missiles fell on Iraq on March 20.

Mr Garner said some ministries would open next week and all of them would be run by Iraqis, although they would be overseen by “coordinators” from the US-led restructuring team.

One of Garner’s aides, Major General Carl Strock, said that US-led forces had restarted some oil and gas production in the north and south of the country.

“This is strictly for domestic use, for Iraqi internal needs — it’s not for export,” said Gen Strock, a member of the US army corps of engineers.

Some 175,000 barrels per day were being pumped in the south while in the north, gas wells were operational and US forces hoped to start pumping 60,000 bpd in the coming days, the general said.

Earlier, Mr Garner began searching for local leaders to work with United States forces occupying Iraq to rebuild the country.

“Our purpose here in your country is to create an environment for you so that we can begin a process of government that leads to a democratic form in Iraq,” Jay Garner told an all-male group of 60 handpicked Iraqis.

Garner’s deputy, Tim Cross, said that those invited to the meeting — a group including university professors and government technocrats — were not necessarily being groomed for posts in an eventual administration.—AFP