WASHINGTON, Jan. 19 (UPI) -- U.S. officials estimate billions of dollars appropriated for reconstruction in Iraq have been wasted.
In testimony before the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday morning, Stuart Bowen, the Pentagon's special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, said that the potential loss could be as much as 10 to 15 percent of the $22 to 25 billion that Congress directed at reconstruction efforts in Iraq, Voice of America reported.
U.S. Comptroller General David Walker, who also testified before the Armed Services Committee, declined to estimate the figure of the amount of monetary waste, citing ongoing investigations.
"I can tell you that it is in the billions," Walker said. "How many billions, I couldn't tell you right now."
He said that the final figure could be higher than many expect.
The goal of tracking how much money has been wasted has intensified since the Democrats took over control of the House and Senate and the military effort in Iraq is clearly flagging. Since the start of the U.S. military campaign in Iraq, congressional leaders have been outraged by reports of fraud and abuse by private contractors.
Government auditors with the U.S. Government Accounting office and inspector generals from the State Department and the Department of Defense have met obstacles in collecting data due to the security situation in Iraq. For this reason, exact figures have been difficult to obtain.
Walker also commented on the challenges facing reconstruction efforts in Iraq. He said that the Bush administration wrongly assumed that they would have a relatively stable and secure environment in which to undertake reconstruction after the military campaign, VOA reported.
