The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
562.
The Chilean
proposal omitted the demand for a public statement by
Saddam
Hussein but
repeated the UK proposal for interviews outside Iraq. The remaining
tests
were a
subset of the UK proposals, requiring Iraq to:
•
disclose
any remaining warhead with mustard gas or mustard gas bombs
or
any documentation
to prove their destruction;
•
disclose
the 10,000 litres of anthrax or account for its
destruction;
•
destroy any
Al Samoud 2 missiles and their components; and
•
disclose
any information stating that “Remote Control” vehicles do not
carry
chemical
weapons.
563.
President
Lagos also stated that the “great powers” had “unfortunately failed
to
include”
the “delicate equilibrium” between “reasonable goals and realistic
deadlines”
in their
proposed resolutions. Chile would “not concur with a resolution”
that failed “to
exhaust all
the means available to complete Iraqi disarmament and preserve
world
peace”. It
was “still possible to reach an understanding and strengthen
international
unity”; and
that unity would be “the only guarantee of a stable, fair peace”.
Chile believed
that Iraqi
disarmament could “still be done while preserving and strengthening
the
international
institutional framework afforded by the United Nations and its
Charter, and
seeking any
other alternative for the rule of law to prevail over
force”.
564.
Dr Blix
wrote that the Chilean proposal replaced the requirement for a
televised
speech from
Saddam Hussein with a less humiliating letter from the Iraqi
leadership and
extended
the time given for attainment of the benchmarks to three weeks or
30 days
and for
Council collectively to assess if Iraq had attained the benchmarks
and to decide
on further
action.189
Chile was
“not willing to let the Council abdicate this
prerogative.
The US on
the other hand were not ready to drop the claim of a right to go it
alone.”
565.
Sir Jeremy
Greenstock reported that US pressure on Chile had
contributed
to its
decision to stop work on its proposal.
566.
Sir Jeremy
told his colleagues in New York that the UK would
continue
to look for
agreement on its proposals. Key decisions would be made at
the
Azores Summit.
567.
Reporting on
developments on 14 March, Sir Jeremy Greenstock wrote that
the
U-6 had
“made no further efforts to achieve consensus” and their proposal
had been
189
Blix
H. The Search
for Weapons of Mass Destruction: Disarming Iraq. Bloomsbury
Publishing Plc,
2005.
190
Telegram
451 UKMIS New York to FCO London, 15 March 2003, ‘Iraq: 14
March’.
496