Iraq: May 18, 2003

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Arrangements have been made to pay a million civil servants for the month of May. Pensions for retired civil servants will also be paid. The Iraqi currency, the dinar, is about to be replaced with a new dinar that does not have Saddam Husseins picture on the bank notes. The exchange rate has improved. Before the war, it was 1,800 dinars to the dollar. It peaked at 4,000 to the dollar during the war and is now down to 900 to the dollar. 

There are now 25,000 American troops in Baghdad, the most lawless of Iraq's cities. It's been decided to prohibit 30,000 senior Baath party members from any government jobs. This reverses an earlier policy that was going to try and exempt those effective civil servants who belonged to Baath because it was required for everyone in the senior civil service.