Sabotage costs Iraq billions

BAGHDAD - Sabotage on Iraq's decrepit infrastructure and oil industry have cost the economy billions of dollars, the country's United States governor said yesterday, as firefighters battled to control a pipeline blaze.

US Army engineers dropped water from helicopters to try to douse the flames on the main oil export pipeline to Turkey, a crucial economic lifeline which reopened last week but was shut down two days later after it was set ablaze.

US administrator Paul Bremer told CNN in Baghdad that hardcore supporters of fugitive dictator Saddam Hussein were behind the attacks.

"These are probably people left over from the old regime who are simply fighting a rearguard action by attacking Iraq's assets," said Bremer. "We've had these attacks on a pretty regular basis over the last three months causing literally billions of dollars of losses to the Iraqi people."

Meanwhile, a US soldier was killed by an explosive device in Baghdad yesterday.

The military did not give details about the circumstances.

Bremer said the death of Reuters cameraman Mazen Dana, shot dead by an American soldier as he filmed outside a prison, was "a tragic accident". Dana was the second Reuters cameraman killed by US forces in Iraq.

As well as targeting the oil export pipeline, saboteurs had been mounting frequent attacks on the power grid. Sabotage and theft of power cables have caused electricity blackouts in the south of Iraq and badly hit exports from the country's southern oilfields.

A bomb attack on a major water pipeline in north Baghdad cut off water to up to four million people for several hours, in searing summer temperatures.

More than 200,000 people were still without water but a spokesman for the United Nations agency Unicef said it had repaired the damage.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq