Others that did get American money include groups seeking to monitor the elections, but a quasi-official election commission blocked them from doing the job.

ECONOMIST: Tentative steps down the road to democracy | The

The job will not be easy: three years ago, before inspectors were blocked, they had turned up the important bits of Iraq's nuclear weapons programme, destroyed most (not all) of its missiles, disposed of thousands of tonnes of chemical weapons and their ingredients, and they were closing in on its production of nerve agents and its best-kept biological secrets.

ECONOMIST: No peace in the Middle East without disarming Iraq

Moves to give a freer hand to the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights a job now held by Navi Pillay, a South African judge had been blocked.

ECONOMIST: The United Nations and Libya