By Tim Arango, New York Times, July 11/12, 2012

Photo credit: Duraid Adnan/The New York Times

Caption: From billboards in Baghdad, an unauthorized image of Ms. Couric beams out at passers-by in an advertisement for a daily news bulletin about electricity.

BAGHDAD — [....]

At more than two dozen locations around this city, officials have posted giant billboards of Ms. Couric, [....] Ms. Couric beams out at passers-by in an advertisement for a daily news bulletin about electricity that is produced by the government and is shown on 11 satellite television channels.

“It doesn’t give me hope about electricity, but I like to see her beautiful face,” Habib Harbi, who sells watermelon in the summer and sweets in the winter, said as he looked across the street at the billboard from his fruit stand [....]

“We were looking for a bright and optimistic face that inspires the people to imagine a better future for electricity,” said Musaab al-Mudarrs, the spokesman for the Electricity Ministry, who said designers had plucked Ms. Couric’s image from the Internet [....]

Murtada Khassim, who sells cologne and bars of soap from a wooden cart near another billboard of Ms. Couric’s smiling face, and who lives in an apartment nearby, said he had had 10 straight hours of power the previous night, a substantial improvement from last summer, when most residents had just a few hours each day.

“Whoever comes here says, ‘What a beautiful face,’ ” Mr. Khassim said. “She’s smiling. She gives us hope.” [....]