Struggling beneath headlines of political and civil uncertainty are signs of Iraq's normalization:

Iraq plans to spend 300 million dollars on planes and hopes European giant Airbus will come up with a new offer within two weeks, more than a decade after a proposed deal was frozen, the interim transport minister said.

"We have a budget of 300 million dollars to lease or buy aircraft from Airbus and Boeing," Behnam Polis told AFP -- a budget that he hopes will kickstart Iraq's grounded national airline. He said he had discussed the stalled deal with Airbus officials during a visit to Britain last week, but that officials in Paris had been unable to see him.

"We discussed everything. We want to cooperate with Airbus and I am expecting them to give us a proposal in two weeks," Polis said.

Engineering News Record is reporting the introduction of a web-based cartographical-geographical database to help coordinate reconstruction; and while the past two months have been difficult for the harvesting of the Iraqi people's greatest natural resource, rebuilding continues.