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BAGHDAD — On the western bank of the Tigris River, scenes of intense activity rarely witnessed in Iraq are unfolding behind the fortified perimeter of the closely guarded Green Zone.

Trucks shuttle building materials to and fro. Cranes, at least a dozen of them, punch toward the sky. Concrete structures are beginning to take form. At a time when most Iraqis are enduring blackouts of up to 22 hours a day, the site is floodlighted by night so work can continue around the clock.

This is to be the new U.S. Embassy in Iraq, and it will be the biggest embassy in the world. It also is the biggest construction project under way in battered Baghdad, where the only other cranes rising from the skyline belong to Saddam Hussein's abandoned project to build the world's biggest mosque.

The irony is not lost on Mohammed Jasim, 48, a truck driver who was forced out of his home last month by sectarian violence and now is squatting in an abandoned building just across the river from the $592 million embassy project.

"They could build houses or they could bring security to Baghdad," Jasim complained as he sat in the shade of a big tree on the riverbank. "But it's clear they came here only for their own benefit, because you can see how much money they're spending across the river."

Though the site is an open secret, U.S. Embassy officials, currently based out of Saddam's former Republican Palace, are forbidden to discuss it.

The few details available are contained in a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report. Scheduled for completion in June 2007, the 104-acre embassy compound, roughly the size of the Vatican, will resemble a ministate, entirely independent from the outside world. It will generate its own power, pump its own sewage and draw its own water.

Within the compound there will be six buildings containing 619 apartments for diplomats, a barracks for Marine guards, separate residences for the ambassador and his deputy, a gym, a swimming pool, a club, a food court, a beauty salon, a vehicle workshop and a warehouse. There is also, the report noted, an emergency exit.

On schedule, within budget

The Senate report marveled at the meticulous planning.

"Most major construction projects undertaken in Iraq since 2003 have not met these standards," it said. "No large-scale U.S.-funded construction program in Iraq has yet met its schedule or budget," the report added, noting that this one is both on schedule and within budget.

Iraqis also are marveling at the scale of the project and the rapid rate at which it is starting to rise above the walls of the Green Zone, which is off-limits to most Iraqis.

"Why are they only building this building?" asked Abdul Kareem al-Khiat, sales manager of the 14-story Babylon Hotel, whose riverside rooms have panoramic views of the construction site. "All the Iraqis are asking this question."

The lack of security is the main answer. Violence has deterred all but the most meager reconstruction projects.

For security reasons, the new embassy is being built entirely by imported labor. The contractor, First Kuwaiti General Trading and Contracting Co., which was linked to human-trafficking allegations by a Chicago Tribune investigation last year, has hired a work force of 900 mostly Asian workers who live on the site.

Most American civilians working in Baghdad are forbidden to leave the Green Zone because of the dangers.

To most Iraqis, however, the Green Zone is another planet. Only one much-bombed entry point admits ordinary Iraqis, who must endure body searches at each of five checkpoints before being admitted to one small portion of the zone.