IMF says has no current plans to set up Iraq office

WASHINGTON, June 2 (Reuters) The International Monetary Fund has no plans to send a permanent representative to Iraq, an IMF spokesman said, more than a week after the World Bank said it planned a return to Baghdad.

''The IMF has no current plans to have a resident representative or people on the ground in Iraq in the near future,'' IMF chief spokesman Masood Ahmed told a regular news briefing yesterday.

The IMF and World Bank evacuated their staff from Baghdad after the bombing of the UN headquarters in August 2003.

Since then the IMF has held discussions with Iraqi officials either in neighboring Jordan or in Washington.

The World Bank has operated from an office in Amman, with a consultant and Iraqi staff in Baghdad. On May 16, the bank said it would scale up its presence in the Iraqi capital to include a resident representative and more expatriate staff to deal directly with the new government and donors.

''We are in contact with the authorities in Iraq and we will continue to be in contact with them, so that is the ongoing process,'' the IMF's Ahmed said.

The IMF approved a 15-month 685 million dollar stand-by loan agreement with Iraq's interim government on December 23, 2005. The program aims to support Iraq's economic program for 2006, which hopes to allocate resources to expanding the oil sector and redirecting expenditures from general subsidies, and expanding the participation of the private sector in the economy.

The fund has cautioned that the rebuilding of the economy depends on improved security.

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