“The pillaging is still going on in most of them,” said Abdel Hamid Majid, speaking from the burned-out hulk of the Irrigation Ministry where he works.

“Every day we come to work here but in the afternoon we have to leave because of the thieves. They are creating chaos and no one is stopping them. The security situation is still very fragile in Baghdad,” he said.

“The Americans assured us they had made an agreement with a company connected to the Housing Ministry to get our building back in shape. I hope they do it soon.”

But things at the Housing Ministry don’t look too hopeful. A gang of youths has stationed a car out front, right in the open, to load up its haul from the building.

Over at the Education Ministry, groups of young people are carrying out doors and windows and whatever else comes to hand. At Baghdad’s massive Industries Ministry, the site belies claims that it will reopen for business today. The gardens have been turned into a rubbish tip and the entry is flooded by open sewage. “Looters cleaned it out and set it on fire,” said the building’s guardian, Mezhar Alwash. “The ministry wasn’t bombed by the Americans.”

Meanwhile, staffers at the Commerce Ministry have had a makeshift wall built around the complex to try to keep out the looters. Iraq’s US overseer Paul Bremer said last week that Iraq was “open for business” and his administration has named senior advisors to all of Iraq’s government ministries. But cleanup efforts have been slow where they have taken place at all and with a flood of weapons in the lawless streets of the capital, there is hardly any authority to crack down on the thieving.

Only the oil and interior ministries have been untouched, both of them surrounded by barricades manned by US troops. Some sites are also facing another problem — squatters who have moved in and don’t appear ready to move back out any time soon. “Entry forbidden — this building is occupied by a family,” reads a sign on a building at the Information Ministry, which along with the Defense Ministry has been abolished by the coalition.

Meanwhile, the US Central Command admitted yesterday the US Army mistakenly released a man from custody in Iraq who is suspected of involvement in the massacre of thousands during the Shiite rebellion in 1991. Mohammed Jawad An-Neifus was released from custody in Umm Qasr in southern Iraq on May 18 after screening by the US forces.

The Central Command statement said that “US military forces are solely responsible for his erroneous release and are conducting a thorough investigation to ensure no further recurrences.” The coalition forces are now trying to rearrest An-Neifus and are offering a reward of $25,000 for information leading to his capture.

US-led engineers, bombarded by complaints, have restored Iraq’s power supply almost to rickety prewar levels, but Baghdad’s five million people get less than in Saddam Hussein’s era. The US-led war that ousted Saddam sowed havoc on Iraq’s infrastructure, already battered by nearly 13 years of economic sanctions.

Many overhead transmission lines were knocked out in the fighting, but most electrical facilities were untouched by bombing, only to fall victim to vandalism and looting after the conflict ended.

US military engineers, having completed initial emergency assessments and immediate repairs, are gradually handing over operations to Iraqi engineers and teams of mainly US contractors.

Workers have improvised temporary fixes and spliced countless overhead cables destroyed during the conflict, but experts say it will take years to ensure reliable supplies.