International
Iraq open to weapons inspectors returning ?
By Kesava Menon
Manama (Bahrain), Jan. 27. With the sanctions regime likely to undergo a drastic change in less than six months, Iraq appears be making swift moves to adjust to what is likely to become a new reality.
Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister, Tariq Aziz has been visiting Moscow for talks reportedly focussed on the sanctions regime and the changes likely to be introduced to it. According to these reports, Iraq might even agree to allow U.N. weapons inspectors back into the country under specified conditions. Iraq has had to re-think its options since Russia, till recently a staunch supporter of Iraq on the sanctions issue, signalled that it would be amenable to U.S. proposals for a new regimen of "smart sanctions". Russia and the U.S. have been trying to work out the details of this "smart sanctions" regime and current indications are that this system will be adopted within the next four or five months.
The current six-month phase of the "oil-for-food" programme was launched in December and Russia and the U.S. agreed that a drastic overhaul of the sanctions regime would take place before the next review of the programme in June. Under the present conditions, Iraq is free to export as much oil as it likes. But the proceeds from these sales are put into an escrow account controlled by the U.N. Security Council. A committee of the Council is mandated to appraise all contracts for imports that Iraq makes and outlays from the escrow fund are made only when the committee approves the contracts.
Under the "smart sanctions" regimen it is proposed that the Security Council will draw up a list of goods that Iraq is prohibited from importing. Permission for the import of goods not on this list will either not be required at all or will be automatically given. While in theory the "smart sanctions" regimen should appear less irksome to Iraq than the present system, Baghdad has had misgivings on several counts. For one it has been extremely suspicious about the kind of list that will be drawn up under the "smart sanctions" regime. Currently, the committee that oversees import contracts prohibits all items that can be used for dual purposes, that is, goods that could possibly have a military use as well as civilian. This dual purpose clause has been used in cavalier fashion to prohibit the import even of goods that can at best only have a remote connection to any weaponisation programme.
Iraq has wanted a more precise definition of the dual use clause when it is used in the context of a "smart sanctions" regime. It is possible that Russia has been able to work out some compromise on this issue. But Iraq has also opposed the whole system of sanctions — whether the current system or any modified one — on the basis of principle. Iraq argues that the economic sanctions were put in place so as to ensure that the country complied with Security Council resolutions mandating the dismantling of its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programme.
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