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Russia Presents Plan to End Iraqi Oil Embargo, Replace UNSCOM Russia Presents Plan to End Iraqi Oil Embargo, Replace UNSCOM
By John M. Goshko
The Washington Post
January 16, 1999Russia proposed today that the United Nations end the oil embargo on Baghdad and institute a new, less intrusive weapons monitoring system as the basis of a new relationship with Iraq in the aftermath of last month's U.S.-led bombing campaign.
The Russian plan came after the United States and France also made proposals this week for rebuilding a consensus within the Security Council on how to effectively disarm President Saddam Hussein's military forces. The council has been paralyzed by differences among its five permanent members with the power to veto any decision.
So far, the proposals made to the 15-nation council seem only to underscore how wide and seemingly unbridgeable these differences are. For the United States and Britain, advocates of a tough line in dealing with Saddam Hussein, the French and Russian plans offer almost nothing in the way of common ground.
Russia, France and China all favor a flexible approach to Iraq. And in its broad outlines, the Russian proposal, with its call for ending the embargo and changing the rules for weapons inspections, closely echoes the French plan.
The Russian ideas also outline a detailed methodology for reaching that point. They would replace the U.N. Special Commission (UNSCOM) now charged with searching out and destroying Iraq's prohibited weapons with an "assessment team" of experts drawn from many countries that would work out with Iraqi authorities the rules for a new inspection system. When that is accomplished, the embargo would be lifted and the council would replace UNSCOM's use of intrusive, on-the-ground inspections with long-term monitoring conducted through such means as aerial surveillance, television cameras and sensors.
U.S. officials have disagreed with this approach. On Thursday, the United States tried to deflate the pressure for ending the embargo by proposing that Iraq be allowed to sell as much oil as it wants, provided the receipts are used only to buy food and medicine for the hard-pressed Iraqi populace. The acting U.S. ambassador here, A. Peter Burleigh, said the United States does not believe that Iraq is fully disarmed and wants UNSCOM inspectors to resume their work.
Russia has been the most vehement critic of UNSCOM within the council and has called repeatedly in the last month for the dismissal of Richard Butler, the Australian diplomat who is UNSCOM's executive chairman. Today the Russian proposal began by asserting that "the use of force by the United States against Iraq resulted in actual termination of UNSCOM activities."
Russia proposed that the so-called assessment mission should "comprise disarmament experts representing as many countries as possible" and such organizations as the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is responsible for disarming Iraq's nuclear programs, and the Hague-based Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which the Russians say could take over UNSCOM's responsibilities in the chemical and perhaps the biological areas.
The Russian plan says some UNSCOM experts could participate but only "in their personal professional capacity, not representing UNSCOM" and would provide only technical support rather than helping to shape the assessment mission's policy conclusions. When the change is made to monitoring, the work would be done by a special monitoring center "within the framework of the U.N. secretariat." UNSCOM personnel work for the council rather than Secretary General Kofi Annan, who heads the secretariat.
U.S. officials did not comment immediately on the Russian plan. However, other diplomats said privately that its provisions, particularly in regard to UNSCOM, appear to be inspired by the idea that the United States exercises too much influence over Butler and his staff. Calls for broadening the base of UNSCOM's personnel and putting them under Annan's control are regarded within the United Nations as code language for diluting the alleged American influence.
