One reason: Even insurgents are not attacking cell-phone towers because they, too, have become dependent on mobile phones, analysts told United Press International.

The U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003 destroyed much of the nation's telecom infrastructure. Now, analysts see profit potential not in rebuilding the system, but in replacing it with a thoroughly modern network driven largely by the private sector.

"I'd been to Baghdad in the 1980s, before the wars, and the (telecom) infrastructure was not much then ... and much of that has been destroyed" following the U.S. attacks, first in 1991 and then in 2003, said Arno Kosko, senior vice president of EMW in Herndon, Va., a consultancy group.

Speaking at the Wireless Communications Association's annual meeting in Washington Wednesday, Kosko said that like other developing countries, Iraq's immediate telecom needs would be better served by a mobile network rather than landlines based on copper cable or fiber optics, which would require much excavation.

"Looking at Baghdad ... I can't imagine putting cable down" in a city that is already so heavily built up, said Kosko, a former senior consultant on telecommunications at the U.S. Embassy in Iraq's reconstruction management office.

He said there are about 1 million existing phone lines in Iraq and approximately 2 million cell phones, but in a country with nearly 25 million potential users.

Any modern economy requires a reliable telecom network to secure a banking system and ensure economic growth across the entire country, not just in urban areas.

That is why some of the world's poorest countries, such as Bangladesh, have focused more on building cell-phone towers than in burying phone-line conduit, which might be more reliable in the long run but takes too long and costs too much to meet a nation's immediate needs.

Perhaps it comes as no surprise, then, that one Iraqi mobile-phone network already has seized the opportunity to address the country's current lack of infrastructure.

Asiacell, a partnership between Kuwaiti phone group Wataniya Telecom and the United Gulf Bank, has been allowed to operate for profit since 2003 - albeit solely in northern Iraq. The Ministry of Communications has divided the country into three network zones encompassing northern Iraq, southern Iraq and the Baghdad area, and each regional block has been licensed to different carriers.

Asiacell's Iraq operation currently has 800,000 subscribers, but Humam Abuamara, the company's chief executive officer, told conference attendees he expects the number nearly to double, to 1.5 million, by the end of this year, due to soaring demand for cell phones and the slowly rising income of Iraqis.

Abuamara told UPI that Asiacell was prepared to operate at little or no profit, at least for now, so it could provide much-needed baseline services to local communities.

Kosko noted there was no need to camouflage cell-phone towers in Iraq, not even for security reasons.

"Even the insurgents don't want to blow up (the towers) because they use them, too," he said.

Communications networks, including satellite phone receivers, were prime targets during the Iraq war.

Abuamara added that because Asiacell was a Middle Eastern phone network, "everyone appreciates (us and) we don't need to hide (what we do)."

Nonetheless, one executive with a blue-chip U.S. phone network who took part in the conference told UPI much concern remained about Iraq's business environment - not just for security reasons, but also because the government bureaucracy still seems fragmented and uncertain about what its longer-term telecom vision should be.

"It's still a high-risk place," the executive said. "We still need to keep our eyes and ears open" for potential business deals that might pay off in the long run.

All rights reserved. � 2005 United Press International. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by United Press International. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of United Press International.

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