The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
740.
Mr Benn
and Mr Chakrabarti visited Iraq from 17 to 19
September.405
On his
return,
Mr Benn
wrote to Mr Blair:
“Security
remains the
concern.
Provided we get this right alongside the politics,
reconstructing
Iraq is possible … The Iraqis need to be helped to take charge.
We
need to
support them … and to persuade the Americans (who hold very fixed
views)
that this
is both desirable and feasible.
“Improving
life for ordinary Iraqis is the main priority. Electricity, water
and jobs
will
maintain consent and therefore security. It is in the South that
the UK can,
and must,
deliver. Expectations are high. There is progress now on the
Essential
Services
Project … and we are working on the right issues in the very short
term –
infrastructure,
policing, and improving information to Iraqis … In the medium
term
we should
focus our support on helping key Iraqi ministries rather
than
CPA(Baghdad).
Long term, we need to think about how we organise ourselves
for
this kind
of operation.
“We have to
recognise that our influence is limited with the CPA and
Bremer,
although
the UK presence there, and in particular Jeremy Greenstock’s role
in
Baghdad, is
vital in staying alongside both. Therefore it’s what we can do in
the
South that
should occupy our practical, as opposed to our diplomatic,
efforts.
“We are
still not getting our achievements across back in the UK
…
“We must
now turn our attention to the Madrid Donors Conference. We
made
the point
forcefully to Bremer, and encouragingly to the Iraqis, that the
Governing
Council and
the Minister of Finance should be on the top table … We will need
to
lobby other
donors hard, and have a credible pledge to make ourselves
…
“One major
concern is the continuing problem with setting up the
Independent
Advisory
and Monitoring Board for the Development Fund for Iraq (DFI).
Bremer
seems
unconcerned, but it is going to make it very hard to get countries
to put
money in if
the international guardian of the DFI can’t start work. It’s
embarrassing,
and someone
will have to tell Bremer to sort it out, because he won’t do so on
his
own. In the
light of the Conference, and our own pledge, we can then consider
the
next stage
of the UK reconstruction effort.
“As we
reflect on the Iraq experience, we do need to think about how HMG
is geared
up to
respond to the reconstruction phase of such operations. We are
beginning to
do some
thinking on this, but we need to learn lessons for the
future.”
741.
Sir Hilary
Synnott reported from Basra on 22 September that, while in
Basra,
Mr Benn
and Mr Chakrabarti had agreed “extraordinary procedures” for
the
disbursement
of DFID’s £20m contribution to the Essential Services Plan, which
meant
405
Letter Benn
to Blair, 20 September 2003, ‘My Visit to Iraq: 17-19
September’.
128