There is no lack of projects in Baghdad. We hope to begin work on two more projects in the next week to ten days, and will be meeting with the Ministry of Culture (in twenty minutes) to talk about their priorities.

The Ministry of Culture is responsible for the city's theatres, TV, and other public spaces such as auditoriums for the symphony, etc. Already, discussions have been held with the Ministry of Trade to determine which shopping malls would be best to begin work at. We hope to have 200-300 workers by the end of the month involved in these clearing projects. There is no lack of labor willing to work at reasonable prices for the local market, on the contthere is a vast availability of willing workers.

Work began today for the clearing of the shopping center Swakl Hora (Duty Free Market), north of the Zayuna neighborhood in Baghdad.

The work will employ 60 workers for one month. Similar to the Souk Shaab project, the cleaning and clearing work is relatively simple, and there are few structural things which need to be done at this shopping center. Windows and doors on the north side of the complex, which currently overlook the American military base there, will be blocked off to ease safety concerns.

Work began today at the old headquarters complex of the Air Force.

There are four large office buildings in the campus, which range from 7 to 10 stories tall. Most of these buildings have been hit by bombs, and have suffered even more from extensive looting. A few smaller bombed structures will be completely demolished. The buildings are being cleared in preparation for their re-use and reconstruction as offices for the Ministry of Trade, and other projects.

Moamar is foreman of this project, which began with 50 workers and is expected to grow to about 200 workers within two weeks.

One of the four office buildings. They look pretty good from the outside, and structurally most of the buildings are sound in most areas.

A side view of three of the buildings. The buildings are surrounded by squattor housing, families who choose to illegally build structures on the campus of the buildings and reside there. As nothing is being done about squattors, and squattors are occasionally paid off to exit an area, squattor housing is springing up all over abandoned buildings in Baghdad.

The interior of a 2-story structure (bombed). This one will be demolished.

The interior of most of these buildings looks like this. What damage wasn't done by the bombs and the fires was done by the looters, who still run rampant through the buildings.

Looters are fairly sophisticated. As shown here, they bring heavy equipment to use in destroying the infrastructure of these buildings (oxygen tanks and torches to cut out the plumbing & heating system pipes, etc). On the day this picture was taken, 15 March, there were perhaps 50 looters still operating throughout the large complex.

A 2 story structure that will be demolished.

From the top of one of the buildings, looking over to West-Central Baghdad.