The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
108.
Resolution
687, adopted on 3 April 1991, addressed Iraq’s obligations
under
international
law in relation to the possession and use of chemical, biological
and
nuclear
weapons.
109.
The resolution
stated that the Security Council was:
“Conscious
… of the statements by Iraq threatening to use weapons in violation
of
its
obligations under the Geneva Protocol for the Prohibition of the
Use in War of
Asphyxiating,
Poisonous or Other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of
Warfare
signed at
Geneva on 17 June 1925, and of its prior use of chemical
weapons and
affirming
that grave consequences that would follow any further use by Iraq
of
110.
The preambular
paragraphs of the resolution also:
•
recalled
that Iraq had “subscribed to the Final Declaration adopted by all
States
participating
in the Conference of States Parties to the 1925 Geneva
Protocol
and Other
Interested States, held in Paris … January 1989, establishing
the
objective
of universal elimination of chemical and biological
weapons”;
•
recalled
that Iraq had “signed the Convention on the Prohibition of
the
Development,
Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological)
and
Toxin
Weapons and on Their Destruction, of 10 April
1972”;
•
noted the
“importance of Iraq ratifying this Convention”; and of “all
States
adhering”
to the Convention;
•
was aware
of Iraq’s use of “ballistic missiles in unprovoked attacks and
therefore
of the need
to take specific measures in regard to such missiles located in
Iraq”;
•
said that
the Security Council was: “Concerned by the reports in the
hands
of Member
States that Iraq had attempted to acquire materials for a
nuclear-
weapons
programme contrary to its obligations under the Treaty of
Non-
Proliferation
of Nuclear Weapons of 1 July 1968”; and
•
said that
the Security Council was: “Conscious
of the
threat that all weapons of
mass
destruction pose to peace and security in the area and the need to
work
towards the
establishment in the Middle East of a zone free of such
weapons.”
111.
Acting under
Chapter VII of the UN Charter, Section C of the resolution set
out
Iraq’s
disarmament obligations.
112.
Operative
paragraph (OP) 7 of the resolution invited Iraq to reaffirm
unconditionally
its
obligations under the 1925 Geneva Protocol and to ratify the 1972
Convention.45
44
UN Security
Council resolution 687 (1991).
45
Convention on
the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of
Bacteriological
(Biological)
and Toxin Weapons and on Their Destruction,
[signed] London and Moscow and Washington,
10 April
1972.
44