The Khanzad American Village rises on a hillside north of the northern Iraqi town of Irbil, a series of two-storey luxury homes which true to its name are virtually indistinguishable from a suburban planned community in California or Arizona.

One would not know by looking at most of the country that Iraq's economy is booming at a rate that the International Monetary Fund claims will be 7 per cent in 2008 - a natural enough effect of rising oil prices in an economy driven by the public spending of petroleum revenues.