Billions to rebuild Mosul

UP TO 90% OF INFRASTRUCTURE IN CITY DESTROYED ‘One of the largest and most complex stabilisation challenges the UN has faced.’

The battle over, it’s now time to start rebuilding Iraq’s second city, parts of which were literally flattened during the offensive against holed up jihadists of the Islamic State group.

But before this can happen, the chaotic mess caused by the conflict that devastated Mosul must be cleared away.

Standing outside his damaged house in the west of the city, Manaf Yunes looked on as a worker removed rubble from a balcony.

“I don’t have any money because I haven’t been paid for three years. I had to borrow to be able to begin renovating,” the 57-year-old former official said.

On July 10, the authorities announced they had defeated IS in Mosul after a nine-month campaign that unleashed destruction of almost unimaginable dimensions on the ancient city.

According to a preliminary assessment, it will cost more than $1 billion (R13 billion) just to restore basic services such as running water, electricity, schooling and medical care to all of Mosul, said Lise Grande of the UN Development Programme in Iraq.

The western sector was the hardest hit.

“The levels of destruction we are seeing are the worst in Iraq. Western Mosul represents one of the largest and most complex stabilisation challenges the UN has faced,” Grande said.

West Mosul has been eviscerated, its buildings half collapsed or shattered, craters in the road sprouting tangles of misshapen and broken water pipes.

According to a local municipality official, more than 90% of west Mosul’s infrastructure and public services was destroyed. And the figure for private property is nearly as high, at 70%.

He put the cost of the damage at several billion dollars, and said between three and four months would be needed just to “stabilise” the west of the city. – AFP