TOKYO (AFP) - The United States urged international donors to step in to rebuild Iraq's infrastructure after Washington shifted its funding to security to tackle a deadly insurgency.
Iraq's interim government also pleaded for more world support at a donors conference in Tokyo to assess the disbursement of 33 billion dollars in aid pledges already made to Iraq -- of which only 6.7 billion dollars has so far been spent amid chronic instability.
The United States last month shifted 3.46 billion dollars of its own 18.4 billion-dollar aid package to Iraq away from reconstruction to restore security and governance and create jobs.
US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage urged other countries to "step into this void" and spend money on infrastructure.
"I think the electrical and water areas are two areas that would find great favor nationally," Armitage told a news conference in Tokyo.
The United States said the switch in funding will create 35,000 new Iraqi police officers, 16,000 new border control officers and 20 additional Iraqi national guard brigades.
"We believe shifting a majority of money into the security area will allow us to stand up the Iraqi forces much more rapidly and bring much more rapid betterment to the security situation in Iraq," Armitage said.
Some 55 countries and organisations are taking part in the two-day conference which opened Wednesday, the fourth donors' meeting for Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein and the first since the interim government took over from US-led forces in June.
Interim Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh asked the donors to waive the 120 billion dollars in debt left over from Saddam's rule and called on the United Nations to play a more active role in Iraq.
"We need more UN support and we need it now. Please don't let the Iraqi people down," Saleh said.
"Development and stability of Iraq cannot be driven forward through the barrels of guns. Assistance and aid in the short term is the key to destroying the causes of terrorism," he said.
The Tokyo meeting is intended to look at how to allocate the 33 billion dollars pledged at the first donors' conference in Madrid in October 2003, as disbursement has been hampered by insecurity in Iraq.
The interim government has said it will propose to the donors a wish list of commitments to 324 projects costing a total 43.5 billion dollars, including 53 related to infrastructure.
Host Japan announced it would devote 40 million dollars of the five billion dollars it has already pledged to support Iraq's legislative elections due in January.
Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura said the money was being offered in the hope "that the elections take place successfully and on schedule".
Armitage said: "Elections have to be held by the end of January.
"This is a course on which we have embarked and it's one we won't waver from. And of course, elections have to be nationwide."
US officials have acknowledged that the January vote could spark more violence because of the insurgency.
Saleh insisted that Iraq had already met other political deadlines including the June transfer of power.
"We are determined to prove the doubters wrong again and hold elections next year as planned. Our political process is on track despite the odds," Saleh told the conference.
Japan, a close US ally, has some 600 troops in Iraq in its first deployment since World War II to a country of active fighting.
Machimura urged donors to be generous and patient with Iraq, noting that Japan's recovery after World War II "was not completed within a few years".