IRAQ: U.S., U.K., Spain Introduce Resolution On End To Sanctions;
The United States, United Kingdom and Spain today asked the U.N. Security Council to end sanctions on Iraq and give Washington and London control over Iraq's oil revenue to finance reconstruction, with international oversight. U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte introduced an eight-page resolution outlining the plan -- which includes a limited, largely advisory role for the United Nations -- in a closed council meeting this morning.
U.S. diplomats said the proposal was not a "take it or leave it" offer. It does not mention U.N. weapons inspectors. Several council members said they need time to consider the text, which was given to some members yesterday. Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Sergei Lavrov said Moscow has "a long list" of questions (Edith Lederer, Associated Press/Yahoo! News, May 9).
Under the resolution, the council would endorse U.S.-British political and financial control of Iraq for at least a year, transferring all new oil revenue, as well as $3 billion now controlled by the United Nations, to a special assistance fund to be "disbursed at the direction of" U.S.-British authorities in consultation with interim Iraqi officials. The U.N. oil-for-food program would be phased out over four months.
In a move U.S. officials cited in the New York Times called a concession to council members who opposed the war in Iraq, an advisory board to monitor the oil funds' use would be set up and would include representation from the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
The oil sector "is where the graft, corruption, threats and the ability of the previous regime to develop its arsenal of weapons comes from," said an official in U.S. President George W. Bush's administration. "It's an area where ordinary Iraqis and people living far away deserve assurance that it's going to be run transparently and honestly."
The United Nations' role in Iraq's future would also involve the appointment of a U.N. special coordinator who would work with "the authority and the people of Iraq with respect to the restoration and establishment of national and local institutions for representative governance."
Under the current U.S. timetable for Iraq's political future, the coordinator would arrive after a transitional government was in place but before the second phase of building a new government. The Times reports that no explicit government-building authority would be granted to the coordinator under the U.S.-British-Spanish resolution but that the resolution specifically envisions that the official would coordinate U.N. and nongovernmental organization reconstruction efforts (Barringer/Weisman, New York Times, May 9).
British U.N. Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock said yesterday in Washington that an international conference would likely decide on a transitional government for Iraq once the U.S.-led military occupation wound down, but he offered no timetable for such a conference. In the meantime, Greenstock said, cooperation between the occupying powers of Iraq and the United Nations is increasing (Mark Kukis, UN Wire, May 9).
Contradictory Signals Over Resolution's Prospects
A senior Bush administration official said the resolution is "designed to get a 15-to-0 vote at the Security Council." Negroponte said lifting sanctions on Iraq "should be accomplished within the next couple of weeks."
The Times reports that knowledgeable diplomats said France has indicated its willingness to refrain from using its veto against, and possibly even vote for, the resolution. German officials told the Bush administration this week that they will support lifting sanctions, U.S. and German officials told the Times.
Russia has focused on the need to fulfill requirements set up in existing resolutions, especially the requirement that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction disarmament be certified by U.N. inspectors, but diplomats cited by the Times said Russia could support the new resolution because about $1.5 in Russian contracts with Iraq could be honored.
Negroponte said Washington sees no role for U.N. weapons inspectors "for the foreseeable future" (Barringer/Weisman, New York Times).
Speaking at a seminar with U.S. lawmakers and think tank experts at the U.S. Capitol, Greenstock predicted yesterday that council members will find it "encouraging that we are proposing the kind of role they want for the U.N."
"I believe that they will accept, broadly, what is being proposed, although they will fight for a bit more, because there are some that want the U.N. to play a leading role in the reconstruction of Iraq. I believe that that leading role will come later, when the occupying powers have decided that it's time to move over and let the Iraqis take on the responsibilities of a transitional government," Greenstock said (Kukis, UN Wire).
But European Union Development Commissioner Poul Nielson, who has just returned to Denmark from Iraq, expressed skepticism about U.S. intentions. Nielson told DR Radio that the United States "will appropriate the oil. ... It is very difficult to see how this would make sense in any other way."
"I think that the United States is on its way to becoming a member of OPEC [the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries," Nielson said.
A European Commission spokesman said Nielson's stance "is not the commission's position" (Reuters/MSNBC.com, May 9).
Peacekeeping Meeting Held In London
Fifteen countries met yesterday in London for the second time to plan for an Iraq peacekeeping force.
The British Defense Ministry called the meeting a work session and said no announcements would be made. A British government source told Agence France-Presse that the United Nations "does not want to play a role in terms of security in the country" (AFP/Voila, May 8, UN Wire translation).
Asked by Le Monde for his opinion of an Iraqi security force without a U.N. mandate, U.N. Undersecretary General for Peacekeeping Jean-Marie Guehenno offered no views on peacekeeping in the country, commenting instead on Iraq's political future.
"Whatever the nature and the scope of the role that could be entrusted to the U.N.," Guehenno said, "it is essential that the Security Council reach a substantive agreement. An arrangement that would be only a facade would affect the U.N.'s capacity for being effective."
"Can a consensus be reached rapidly? Or will it be built gradually, with a gradual defining of the exact scope of the U.N.'s role?" Guehenno asked. "It is still too early to say. That is why it is better, for now, to think in terms of the range of possible activities, rather than wanting right away to have a clear idea of everything that will be done" (Corine Lesnes, Le Monde, May 9, UN Wire translation).
U.S. Has Released 7,000 Iraqis
U.S. defense officials said yesterday that U.S. forces have released 7,000 Iraqi prisoners captured during the war, including more than 3,700 who pledged in writing not to participate in hostilities with U.S. troops. U.S. military police are still detaining about 2,000 Iraqi prisoners (Mintz/Loeb, Washington Post, May 9). Morale Reported Faltering At U.N. Headquarters Over Iraq War, U.S. Stances
Le Monde reports today that morale is down at U.N. headquarters in New York now that the United States has executed a war in Iraq without a U.N. mandate.
According to the French daily, some at the United Nations believe U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan should have resigned to protest the Iraq war. An Annan spokesman, though, said that "a secretary general is not supposed to take grandiloquent positions. ... If he does, some factions will see him as a hero, but he will no longer carry any weight as secretary general."
An engineer employed by the world body said the current climate compares unfavorably with the situation only a short time ago. "There was the Nobel Prize [given to Annan and the United Nations in December 2001], the Monterrey Conference on Financing for Development [held in March 2002]. The United States was engaged. It had put money on the table. Now, whether with or without the United States, how effective can the U.N. be?" the engineer said.
"We wonder what purpose we will serve," said another U.N. employee. "The Americans will end up making us into the useless bureaucrats they have been describing for 15 years."
A young official told Le Monde at a reception last week, "Right now, I'm all right, because I drank a margarita. ... But otherwise, I'm completely depressed. We're going back to the 19th century, with the Americans' vision of the world -- empire. If force wins out, the U.N. will no longer be good for anything" (Lesnes, Le Monde II, May 9, UN Wire translation).
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