December 15, 2003	Monday	Shawwal 20, 1424

WASHINGTON: The Bush administration’s decision to exclude countries that opposed the war on Iraq from multi-billion-dollar reconstruction deals contradicts its position both on free trade and its self-described mission in Iraq, analysts here say.

US allies like Canada, France and Germany, and its old foe Russia, will lose lucrative contracts because they opposed the war. The countries have objected, especially since the United States is also asking them to forgive Iraq’s foreign debts.

The US defended the policy, first revealed in a memo by Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, as “appropriate and reasonable”.

However, some analysts here say the move raises doubts about whether the reconstruction of Iraq is the administration’s main goal at all.

“Wolfowitz’s decree forces us all to ask the question again: are these reconstruction contracts for the benefit of Iraq, or are they political rewards, handed out to ‘friends’?” said Rania Masri of the US-based Institute for Southern Studies.

She said the decision shows that “transforming the Iraqi economy for foreign ownership and foreign plunder is the main goal”. Masri referred to the quick move to privatize the Iraqi economy. Weeks into the occupation, while the Iraqi infrastructure was still in ruins, the US civilian administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer, removed all tariffs and trade restrictions. This devastated the Iraqi textile and poultry industries, she said.

Bremer has also imposed a 15 per cent flat tax, and allowed 100 per cent foreign ownership of almost all Iraqi industries.—Dawn/The InterPress News Service.