James Wolfensohn told Reuters in an interview that his bank and other agencies found it difficult to operate in Iraq because of instability there, although the situation in some areas was not as bad as television reports from Iraq suggest.

“Cash pledged for Iraq has started flowing now. The biggest amount of money is from the $18 billion offered by the United States, which you know started slowly. But there is a real push in the United States to try and introduce it,” said Wolfensohn, in Ethiopia for a UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) conference on governance.

An initial trust fund run by the World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme has already started paying out money.

”Indeed the bank’s portion, which is $400 million-and-something, all of it is now either planned or committed and will be in action by the end of this year,’ Wolfensohn said.

“Obviously all of this is to some extent held up by the situation on the ground because it is not easy to operate.”