1.1 | UK
Iraq strategy 1990 to 2000
Iraq’s
weapons programmes, if Iraq … fails to comply … with the substance
of the
Commission’s
authority to conduct inspections and interviews without
interference
of any
sort.”
314.
In a statement
after the vote, Mr Qin Huasun, Chinese Permanent
Representative
to the UN,
stated that Iraq had “basically maintained its co-operation” and
that UNSCOM
had “made
great progress in discharging the mandate entrusted to it”. He
added: “Under
these
circumstances, we should consider gradually lifting sanctions
against Iraq in order
to
alleviate its humanitarian difficulties.”
315.
Mr Sergei
Lavrov, Russian Permanent Representative to the UN,
emphasised
the
importance of the Security Council’s consensus on a “balanced”, not
“one-sided”
response
which reflected “both the very core of the problem and the broad
range of
views of
the members of the Security Council”, and was “not based on the
logic of
punishment
but forms part of the Council’s main thrust: to conclude this
disarmament
issue as
quickly as possible and to achieve a lasting post-conflict
settlement in the
Persian
Gulf on the basis of resolution 687 (1991)”.
316.
On
1 July, Mr Richard Butler, an Australian diplomat and
former Permanent
Representative
to the UN, succeeded Mr Ekéus as the Executive Chairman
of
317.
From
mid-September 1997 there were further serious incidents in which
UNSCOM
access to
designated sites was denied or delayed, and material was moved
or
destroyed,
which were reported to the Security Council.
318.
On
3 September, the JIC stated that Iraq had:
“… claimed,
however, that it had terminated the [BW] programme and
destroyed
its arsenal
before UN inspections began in 1991. These admissions, while
assessed
to be
largely accurate, are incomplete. We assess that Iraq has withheld
information
on key
elements of its programme: reliable intelligence has described work
on
plague and
suspicions persist of work on other pox viruses.”135
319.
Following a
briefing to Security Council members from Mr Butler about
two
incidents
the previous weekend, the President of the Security Council told
the press
on
17 September that the Council viewed Iraq’s failure to
co-operate and to apply the
procedures
agreed on 22 June “in the gravest terms”, and called on Iraq
to co-operate
134
UN Security
Council, 6 October 1997, ‘Report of the Secretary-General on
the activities of the Special
Commission
established by the Secretary-General pursuant to paragraph 9 (b)
(i) of resolution 687 (1991)’
(S/1997/774).
135
Review of
Intelligence on Weapons of Mass Destruction [“The
Butler Report”], 14 July 2004, HC 898,
page
135.
136
United
Nations Daily Highlights, 17 September 2007.
79