Wednesday, March 31 – In Berlin, Germany, a two-day international conference on reconstruction assistance to Afghanistan began. The conference was attended by 65 countries. Alastair McKechnie, the World Bank country director for Afghanistan, hoped to accumulate during the conference donations of US$27.5 billion (to be granted over seven years). Afghan interim president Hamid Karzai and United States Secretary of State Colin Powell announced that the United States had, on top of the US$1.2 billion already promised, pledged an additional US$1 billion in aid for 2004. Japan promised US$525 million more over the next two years. German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder pledged (in addition to US$391 million promised at a conference in Tokyo in 2002) US$391 million over the next four years.