6.5 | Planning and preparation for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, January to March 2003

humanitarian challenges which may lie ahead in Iraq is that it is limited, and this involves

serious risk.”

912. Ms Short stated that DFID would have two roles in the event of conflict:

• to help advise UK Armed Forces on their obligations under the Hague and

Geneva Conventions; and

• to use the funds, expertise and influence available to it to support delivery of

humanitarian assistance by the international community.

913. She added that DFID was deploying staff to key locations in the region, had

brought DFID’s stockpile of non-food items, vehicles and equipment “to immediate

readiness”, was procuring additional supplies and was positioning some of those stocks

in Kuwait and elsewhere in the region.

914. Ms Short explained that she had decided to supplement the extra £3.5m

announced on 10 February381 to support UN humanitarian contingency planning with a

further £6.5m, part of which would support a small number of NGOs in their contingency

preparations. That was in addition to DFID’s ongoing humanitarian programme for

Iraq, expected to amount to £8m in 2002/03, and its regular funding to the UN and

other humanitarian agencies, which included provision for emergency preparedness

worldwide.

915. Ms Short announced:

“My Department is also considering the longer term reconstruction and reform

issues. It is clear that a UN mandate will be required to provide legal authority for

the reconstruction effort, and to make possible the engagement of the international

financial institutions and the wider international community.”

916. DFID provided further information in its detailed response to the Committee’s

report on 21 March.382

917. The Inquiry has seen no evidence that a cross-government humanitarian

plan for Iraq was ever produced.

918. One week before the invasion, with no reference to potential timescales,

costs or measurable outcomes, the DFID paper did no more than restate DFID’s

position on an issue where there was no cross-government consensus.

919. The ‘Humanitarian Strategy and Immediate Assistance Plan’ was the last

DFID plan prepared before the invasion of Iraq.

381 House of Commons, Official Report, 10 February 2003, column 526W.

382 House of Commons International Development Committee Second Special Report of Session

2002-03, Preparing for the Humanitarian Consequences of Possible Military Action Against Iraq:

Government Response to the Committee’s Fourth Report of Session 2002-03, HC 561.

477