15.1 | Civilian
personnel
173.
The FCO Senior
Overseas Security Adviser (SOSA) and the Director of CHAD
OT
visited
Basra from 18 to 20 August and Baghdad from 20 to 22
August.116
They
reported
their
findings to an official‑level meeting of COBR, the Government’s
emergency
response
mechanism, chaired by Mr Graham Fry, FCO Director General
Wider World,
174.
The two
officials described the picture in Baghdad as “relatively
reassuring”.
Overall
security and staff awareness in the CPA zone, where the British
Office Baghdad
would be
located for the foreseeable future, had improved, but DFID and the
FCO were
taking
additional steps to reinforce security awareness “as a matter of
urgency”. Basra
was “more
alarming”. Security at the CPA compound there was “still
inadequate”.
•
Staff in
Basra should move to more secure locations within Basra Airport
until
satisfactory
physical security measures were in place, subject to
Sir Hilary
Synnott’s
agreement that the move “would not compromise the
operational
effectiveness
of the CPA in Basra to an unsatisfactory level”.
•
The FCO
should consider appointing permanent security managers for
Baghdad
and Basra
to provide a rolling review of the threat.
•
The Cabinet
Office should raise the seriousness of the situation at the
next
Ministerial
meeting on Iraq and “reiterate the need to deploy only those
staff
deemed
essential”.
176.
Advice
prepared by officials for the 28 August AHMGIR did not reflect the
COBR
conclusions
on deploying only “essential” staff.
177.
Before the
AHMGIR on 28 August, Mr Neil Crompton, Head of the IPU,
advised
Mr Straw:
“Concerns
about security argue against putting in more staff [in Basra],
but
holding
staff back, or withdrawing staff temporarily, will only compound
the problem.
The
immediate solution is to strengthen security measures in CPA(South)
…
Civilian
staff also need to be provided with a large fleet of armoured
vehicles: until
these
arrive, which will take time, we need more assistance with
escorting from the
military …
Resources for security assets are an issue. But the principle
should be
that we
provide the number of security assets we need for people to do
their jobs
properly,
rather than limit the number of tasks we take on to the number of
security
assets we
have on the ground (as some around Whitehall have been
suggesting).
This will
be expensive.” 118
116
Minute CHAD
OT to Austin, 27 August 2003, ‘Security Assessment of Baghdad and
Basra’ attaching
Paper CHAD
OT, ‘DFID Security Assessment of Basra and Baghdad’.
117
Minute OD
Secretariat [junior official] to Sheinwald, 26 August 2003, ‘COBR:
Iraq Security Situation:
Update’.
118
Minute
Crompton to PS [FCO], 28 August 2003, ‘Ad Hoc
Ministerial’.
273