WASHINGTON, March 30 (UPI) -- The United States plans to spend an additional $1 billion to rebuild Haiti's infrastructure and re-create its fragile government, The Washington Post reports.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is to announce the plan, which has not been made public, Wednesday at an international conference for donors to relief efforts in the earthquake-ravaged Caribbean nation, the Post said.
The newspaper said the broad effort comes after an internal Obama administration assessment found the U.S. government had provided $4 billion in aid to Haiti since 1990 but "struggled to demonstrate lasting impact."
The plan differs from past efforts to help the nation through its emphasis on building a strong government and training its officials while helping create building codes, regulatory systems and methods to root out corruption.
"We are completely focused on how to build the capacity of the Haitian government effectively," Cheryl Mills, Clinton's chief of staff, told the Post. "That is something everyone has recognized as being one of the failures of aid in the past."
Former President Bill Clinton, the U.N. special envoy to Haiti, is to co-chair a commission of Haitian officials and donors overseeing billions of dollars in foreign aid, the Post said.
"The U.S. government is playing a leading role. It's not by accident Mr. Clinton is down there," said Ciro de Falco, head of the Haiti task force established by the Inter-American Development Bank. "They are committed to seeing this earthquake turn into an opportunity."
