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Al-Ahram Weekly 23 - 29 September 1999 Issue No. 448 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 23 - 29 September 1999 Issue No. 448
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Comment Focus Special Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters US dilemma over Iraq
By Salah HemeidThe US State Department released its report, "Saddam Hussein's Iraq" last week. It claimed the 13-page report was intended "to present the facts concerning Iraq" under Saddam. The report was also put on the Department's website in Arabic and English to ensure the widest possible publicity. It contains a scathing record of what it describes as Saddam's repression of his people, threats to the region and the obstruction of efforts to provide humanitarian relief for Iraqis under UN sanctions.
Among the main charges the report makes against Saddam's regime are: murdering opponents, eliminating opposition, draining southern marshes, destroying villages, relocating Shi'ites and Kurds and carrying out summary and arbitrary executions.
The report also states that Iraq remains dangerous and defiant because it has neither disarmed nor apologised nor demonstrated remorse for its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Iraq is also charged with obstructing the oil-for-food programme which has caused suffering for the Iraqi people and personal enrichment for the regime's leaders.
The report is accompanied by previously unreleased aerial photos showing the destruction that Washington believes was wrought by the regime's forces against the Shi'ite opposition in the south and Kurds in the north.
Given the grave accusations made against Saddam's regime, the report concludes by reiterating US policy towards Iraq -- that sanctions imposed after Saddam's invasion of Kuwait can only be lifted when the regime complies fully with all relevant UN resolutions. It also repeats the cornerstone of its strategy towards Iraq: "As long as Saddam Hussein is in power, we are determined to contain the Iraqi regime and prevent it from threatening the region or its people."
Iraq immediately dismissed the report as a sign that Washington has a problem convincing the world of its policy towards Iraq. "No one would accept these accusations with any degree of seriousness," said Nizar Hamdoun, Iraq's deputy foreign minister. In a statement carried by the Iraqi News Agency, he said that "they stem from an increasing feeling of weakness by the American administration in the face of rising trends in international public opinion opposing the continuation of the unjust economic sanctions against Iraq". In a later interview, Hamdoun, a former Iraqi ambassador both to the US and the UN, described the report as anti-Iraqi rhetoric prompted by the 2000 US presidential and congressional elections.
It is surprising, however, that the report should come at a time when the US is seeking to redefine its present policy of containment towards Iraq. Current policy -- based on the economic sanctions and airstrikes in the two no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq -- has not achieved US aims and or helped in the efforts to topple the Iraqi regime. Political observers believe, on the contrary, that this policy has prolonged the impasse over Iraq and created more serious problems for the policy makers in Washington.
Two days after the release of the report, high-ranking diplomats from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council met in London at Washington's request, to try to reach an agreement on a new UN resolution and on easing the UN sanctions. For months, Washington has been trying to get France, Russia and China to agree to a British-Dutch draft that calls for suspension of the sanctions in exchange for long-term close monitoring of Iraq's weapons programme. This would replace the UN inspection regime which collapsed last year when US and British forces staged four days of punitive airstrikes against Baghdad for obstructing weapons inspectors.
Although the five states have not reached a final agreement, they decided to resume their discussions in New York at the foreign ministerial level amid signs that a compromise might be in the offing, probably by the end of this month, which will then be presented to the Iraqi leadership for compliance. Under the deal, a Security Council resolution will establish a new mechanism to deal with Iraq including a new weapons monitoring body to replace UNSCOM. Consequent easing of sanctions will give Iraq more freedom to use its oil revenues for trade.
Iraq has not reacted to the report so far, but it has repeatedly rejected any new UN effort to return UN monitors, insisting that all its weapons programmes have already been dismantled. On Thursday Iraq's deputy prime minister Tareq Aziz reiterated the demand that sanctions be lifted: "Any resolution short of that will not be dealt with by Iraq." Such a development will leave only two scenarios: either Iraq will be persuaded to accept the new resolution or it will turn it down and pave the way for another confrontation with the US and Britain.
