Government faces anger and mockery as insurgents step up attacks
Within hours of the latest suicide bombing in Baghdad yesterday, Faleh Naqib, the Iraqi interior minister, had arrived at the scene dressed in a suit and sunglasses to signal his government's determination to tackle the terrible spiral of violence.
At least he was brave enough to venture to the blast site. When the US occupation authorities were running the country before July, none of their officials dared visit the scenes of the countless explosions that have claimed so many innocent lives.
Yet yesterday morning, as most Iraqis do most days, the crowd mocked and taunted the minister and his government, incensed at the lawlessness of the new Iraq.
It is almost exactly 18 months since America and Britain embarked on the invasion and reshaping of Iraq. By now they had expected marked signs of reconstruction and development and the foundation of a democratic process that would wipe clean decades of dictatorship and hold up a model for the Arab world. And yet the project looks bleaker than ever before.
more…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1304895,00.html