 Iraq
|
 Charles
E Williams
CHARLES WILLIAMS News:
20080111
-
 US
- Iraq
-  Charles
E Williams -  Military
- Construction
-  Fire-Fighting
- Safety
-  Politics
- "New
Baghdad embassy's fire-fighting system is defective."
... "The fire-fighting system in the mammoth new $740 million U.S. [United
States] Embassy in Baghdad is defective, according to documents obtained
by McClatchy and U.S. officials, who said that their concerns were ignored
or overruled in a rush to declare the complex completed." ... ""As far
as I know, nothing's been fixed," said one State Department official, who
spoke on condition of anonymity because he feared retaliation for speaking
to the news media. "The lives of the people who are working in that building
are going to be at stake" if the complex doesn't meet building codes, he
said." ... "The 104-acre embassy complex, which has been hit at least once
by mortar fire, will house more than 1,000 U.S. diplomats, coalition military
officials and associated personnel. U.S. diplomats in Iraq are still headquartered
in a former palace of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad's Green Zone and haven't
moved into the new embassy complex." ... "Last month, 19 days before he
retired, State Department buildings chief Charles E. Williams certified
key elements of the embassy's fire-fighting system as ready for operation,
according to the documents McClatchy obtained." ... "His own fire-safety
specialists and an outside consultant, however, had warned Williams and
his aides repeatedly about numerous fire safety violations." ... "Moreover,
Williams' thumbs-up was based on tests run by another contractor that was
hired, not by the State Department, but by the company building the embassy,
First Kuwaiti General Contracting and Trading Co. State Department officials,
members of Congress and others have accused First Kuwaiti of shoddy construction
and questionable labor practices." -By
Warren
P. Strobel -McClatchyDC.com
20071018
-
US
- Iraq
-
 Kuwait
- Charles
E Williams -  Howard
Krongard
- Military
-  Government
- Construction
-  Corporation
-  Criminal
- "Criminal
probe into U.S. Embassy in Iraq construction." ...
"A mortar shell smashed into the hulking new U.S. [United States] Embassy
that's under construction in Baghdad [Iraq's capital] last May, damaging
a wall and causing minor injuries to people inside the building. It also
exposed enormous problems in the management of what's become a $592 million
government construction project." ... "The State Department contractor
in charge of the project, James L. Golden, attempted to alter the scene
of the blast, according to government officials familiar with the incident.
The State Department inspector general prevented Department officials from
investigating the incident, according to interviews and documents." ...
"A congressional committee is examining whether the walls of the still-unfinished
embassy complex, which are supposed to be blast-resistant, performed as
they should have during the mortar attack." ... "U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker
banished Golden from Iraq, but he continues to oversee the construction
of the embassy in Baghdad; to be the liaison with the contractor, Kuwait-based
First Kuwaiti General Trading and Contracting Co.; and to supervise other
projects for the State Department's Overseas Buildings Operations (OBO)
bureau." ... "McClatchy Newspapers has also learned that:" ... "— Aspects
of the embassy's construction are the subject of at least one U.S. government
criminal investigation, according to officials in Congress and the administration."
... "— In order to rush the project, the long-time head of OBO, retired
Army Maj. Gen. [Major General] Charles Williams, signed a waiver in July
2005 allowing a sole-source contract to be awarded to First Kuwaiti." ...
"In a letter to State Department Inspector General Howard Krongard last
month, [California Democratic Representative Henry] Waxman said that former
and current staff members in Krongard's office told the committee that
he'd refused to help investigate alleged wrongdoing by First Kuwaiti and
an unnamed top State Department official." -By Warren
P. Strobel and
Jonathan S.
Landay -McClatchyDC.com
20071007
-
US
- Iraq
- Kuwait
- Construction
-
 Homes
-  Health
- Safety
-  Blackwater
- Military
- Politics
- "Iraq
Embassy Cost Rises $144 Million Amid Project Delays:
Planning, Workmanship Cited as Problems." ... "The massive U.S. embassy
under construction in Baghdad [Iraq's capital] could cost $144 million
more than projected and will open months behind schedule because of poor
planning, shoddy workmanship, internal disputes and last-minute changes
sought by State Department officials [under Republican President Bush],
according to U.S. officials and a department document provided to Congress."
... "The embassy, which will be the largest U.S. diplomatic mission in
the world, was budgeted at $592 million." ... "The growing price tag and
delayed opening have alarmed members of Congress, some of whom regard the
troubled project as the latest in a series of State Department management
problems in Iraq. The department has been criticized for failing to send
enough reconstruction specialists to assist U.S. forces in Baghdad and
for not providing adequate oversight of its principal private security
force, Blackwater USA, whose personnel have been accused of using excessive
force to protect U.S. diplomats." ... "Department officials contend that
some of the delays are a result of poor workmanship by the project's primary
contractor, First Kuwaiti General Trade and Contracting, a Middle Eastern
firm. Apparent building and safety blunders in a facility to house embassy
security guards have made it unsafe to open. Originally due to open last
December, the facility is still not operational because of formaldehyde
fumes in 252 prefabricated residential trailers." ... "A Sept. 18 internal
report on problems with the guard facility's electrical system, prepared
for Charles E. Williams, the director of building operations, suggested
that KBR, the former Halliburton subsidiary hired to run the facility,
was responsible for overloading the system." (1, 2)
-By Glenn Kessler -WashingtonPost
20070817
-
US
-
 World
-  Italy
- Iraq
-  Terrorism
- Construction
- Money
-  Accounting
- Politics
- "Construction
Woes Plague U.S. Embassies: Shoddy Work, Contract
Choices Cited." ... "The new air-conditioning system in the $66 million
U.S. Embassy in Mali broke down in June, sending office temperatures soaring
to 100 degrees. An electrical fire erupted in the rehabilitated annex to
the embassy in Rome [Italy's capital]. And the U.S. ambassador in Belize
had to personally help workers sand the floors for new housing." ... "As
the United States seeks to rapidly modernize and fortify its diplomatic
missions around the world because of terrorism and other security concerns,
the State Department's $5 billion construction efforts abroad have come
under increasing strain. In a series of cables sent to Washington this
summer, U.S. diplomats complained of building delays and shoddy workmanship,
underscoring problems with State's one-size-fits-all approach to building
that results in the same air-conditioning system being shipped to embassies
in Africa and in Europe." ... "Concerns have focused in particular on the
ongoing construction of the largest U.S. Embassy in the world -- the $592
million complex in Baghdad. The State Department inspector general is probing
the awarding of sole-source contracts in the sprawling project, including
whether they are unjustifiably expensive and whether top officials in State's
Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations (OBO) short-circuited the process
to favor particular contractors, according to sources familiar with the
probe." ... "At the center of the controversy is the man who has run the
OBO since the start of the [Republican President] Bush administration --
Charles E. Williams, a retired major general in the Army Corps of Engineers,
who quit under fire as chief operating officer of the D.C. public schools
in 1998 when a botched roof repair project delayed the opening of District
schools by three weeks. State Department officials who have worked with
Williams assert that the serious construction problems now coming to light
flow directly from Williams's mercurial management style.-" -By
Glenn Kessler -WashingtonPost
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