Editor’s note: Click here to watch a related video report from Carmen Gentile in Haiti. PORT SALUT, Haiti — Dardy Saint-Jean looks at the rock-strewn river coursing through his village and shakes his head in disgust. “Look at this river — it’s filled with stones from the mountains,” said Saint-Jean, lamenting the results of decades of erosion caused by deforestation. Much of the destruction can be blamed on the way the majority of the populace subsists in this poor Caribbean nation, where public utilities are unreliable and often unavailable. With few reliable sources of fuel, most Haitians rely on charcoal [...]
Most analysts of the Bush administration’s “surge” strategy in Iraq have focused on its military dimension, especially the prominent deployment of thousands of additional U.S. troops to Baghdad and other contested regions of the country. Another important element of the administration’s strategy, however, is the renewed effort to advance Iraq’s economic reconstruction with the provision of considerable new funding and other additional support. The first results of this economic surge are now in — and they do not look encouraging. According to a July 30 report of the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR), headed by [...]
On July 18, Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs Richard Boucher met with representatives from South and Central Asian countries to discuss how the United States could promote economic integration in their region. The session was part of a dialogue conducted as part of the Third Annual Meeting of the U.S.-Central Asia Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA). The day before, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative hosted the third annual TIFA Meeting. The United States and the five Central Asian countries signed the TIFA agreement in June 2004. The TIFA process focuses on identifying means to [...]
