10.3 |
Reconstruction: oil, commercial interests, debt relief, asylum and
stabilisation policy
444.
Elections for
the Transitional National Assembly (TNA) and Provincial
Assemblies
took place
across Iraq on 30 January 2005.257
The
election results were announced in
mid-February;
the Iraqi Transitional Government would not convene until
April.
445.
Officials from
the British Embassy Baghdad made their first post-election
visit
to the
Ministry of Oil on 2 February.258
They
reported that a senior Iraqi official had
been “scathing”
about Prime Minister Allawi’s Guidelines, which he said had “died
with
the
IIG”.
446.
The Cabinet
Office co-ordinated the production of a strategy paper, focused
on
how to
achieve coalition objectives in post-election Iraq, for the 9
February meeting of
the Ad Hoc
Ministerial Group on Iraq.259
447.
The strategy
identified five key “governance and reconstruction” challenges
in
2005,
including making sustained improvements in the availability of fuel
and electricity,
which would
require difficult reforms and cracking down on corruption and
sabotage.
448.
The strategy
defined five economic priorities for the UK for 2005,
including:
“Promoting
an efficient, outward looking and transparent oil
and energy industry
and
promoting the continuation of a structure for the transparent
management of oil
reserves.”
449.
The Ad Hoc
Ministerial Group on Iraq approved the paper on 9
February.260
450.
A senior Iraqi
official in the Ministry of Oil told Ms Ann Eggington, DTI
Director, on
22 March
that the Ministry was in a “caretaker” role, waiting for the
formation of the new
Government.261
The silence
from the Ministry on the UK’s offer to help develop
model
PSAs was
due to its inability to take forward any significant project work
and long-term
planning
until a new Government was confirmed.
451.
The Iraqi
official commented that the chief task of the new Iraqi Government
would
be to agree
a Constitution; the Ministry would, in parallel, develop a
Petroleum Law.
Model
contracts developed by the FCO project would need to be consistent
with the
Petroleum
Law; there would be differing views on how FDI should be brought
in.
452.
On 28 April,
following lengthy negotiations, Prime Minister Designate
Ibrahim
Ja’afari
presented the majority of the Cabinet for the new Iraqi
Transitional Government
(ITG) to
the TNA for ratification. The ITG was established to run Iraq until
a government
could be
elected according to the new Constitution in December
2005.
257
Public
hearing Chaplin, 7 December 2009, page 12.
258
Email FCO
[junior official] to IPU [junior official], 2 February 2005,
‘Iraq/Oil: Miscellaneous’.
259
Paper
Cabinet Office, 7 February 2005, ‘Iraq Strategy for
2005’.
260
Minutes, 9
February 2005, Ad Hoc Ministerial Group on Iraq
meeting.
261
Letter DTI
[junior official] to FCO [junior official], 23 March 2005, ‘Meeting
with Rhadwan Al-Saadi:
22 March
2005’.
441