$13 Billion Wasted, Stolen in Iraq

A former Iraqi official estimated yesterday that more than $13 billion meant for reconstruction projects in Iraq was wasted or stolen through elaborate fraud schemes. Salam Adhoob, a former chief investigator for Iraq's Commission on Public Integrity, told the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, an arm of the Democratic caucus, that an Iraqi auditing bureau "could not properly account for" the money. While many of the projects audited "were not needed — and many were never built," he said, "this very real fact remains: Billions of American dollars that paid for these projects are now gone."