11.1 |
De-Ba’athification
98.
The Governing
Council (GC) (also referred to as the Iraqi Governing Council
(IGC))
met for the
first time on 13 July. Its creation is described in Section
9.2.
99.
At the first
meeting of the GC, Mr Sawers reported that Dr Chalabi
specifically
thanked
Ambassador Bremer for his decision on
de‑Ba’athification.92
100.
In his account
of the appointment of members of the Council, Mr Sawers
reported:
“Everyone
on the Council was adamant that Ba’athists were totally
unacceptable,
and there
is great praise here that we managed to exclude people who
had
compromised
unacceptably with the Saddam regime. To have included them
would
have been
like welcoming Nazis back into the German Government after
WWII.”93
101.
The CPA and GC
had agreed the authorities of the Governing Council,
which
described
its initial powers.94
They
enabled the GC to make policy in all areas, including
on
de‑Ba’athification.
102.
At the end of
July, a junior UK official working in Baghdad reported to the FCO
on
plans to
put an accelerated vetting process in place for the first set of
senior appointees
103.
The official
wrote that, although substantive work on vetting was to be left
until
there was a
new Iraqi Government in place, the Coalition had done some
preparatory
work. In
that initial phase, the intention was that the
criteria:
“… will
seek to disqualify from key posts only those guilty of crimes
against the
Iraqi
people. They will be defined with care, taking account of the
culture and
methodology
of Saddam Hussein’s repressive apparatus. Attention will also be
paid
to
post‑communist legislation in the three ex‑CEE [Central and Eastern
Europe]
countries
who have high‑level representatives in the CPA. Their personal
views on
the
effectiveness of these laws will be listened to.”
104.
The author of
the telegram commented that he had hoped:
“… to have
these criteria embodied in a new Order … [to] supplement Order
No.1
on
de‑Ba’athification … [which] might also have allayed the concerns
of those Iraqis
who doubt
whether the CPA is being sufficiently robust with the remnants of
the
former
regime (there is a fine line between achieving this and
disqualifying – and
possibly
alienating – those with skills and experience the new Iraq
needs).”
92
Telegram 82
IraqRep to FCO London, 13 July 2003, ‘Iraq: Formation of the
Governing Council’.
93
Telegram 79
IraqRep to FCO London, 13 July 2003, ‘Iraq: Governing Council:
Analysis and Comment’.
94
Telegram 81
IraqRep to FCO London, 13 July 2003, ‘Iraq: Governing Council:
Authorities’.
95
Telegram 1
Security Affairs Iraq to FCO London, 27 July 2003, ‘Iraq Security
Sitrep No.1’.
23