Missing Money Bedevils Iraq Audits

Wow. It sure would be nice to know where $8.7 billion dollars went.

The Pentagon cannot properly account for nearly nine billion dollars in Iraqi oil revenues and other funds received for reconstruction programs after the 2003 US invasion, a US audit found Tuesday.

"The breakdown in controls left the funds vulnerable to inappropriate uses and undetected loss," the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction said in a report.

The Pentagon received 9.1 billion dollars in 2004 from the fund set up by the US-led occupation authority to benefit Iraqis with Iraqi oil and gas revenues and assets seized from the ousted regime of Saddam Hussein.

But the audit found the Pentagon cannot properly account for 8.7 billion dollars because defense agencies that received the money failed to set up required Treasury accounts and no single organization was created to manage the funds.

By: Brant