The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
•
restructuring
the Commission as a collegiate body which could provide
the
Executive
Chairman with independent advice, guidance and general
oversight
as agreed
by the Security Council;
•
recruiting
staff as international civil servants in accordance with the
provisions of
the UN
Charter;
•
training
programmes, including “Particular emphasis … on the importance
of
understanding
national sensitivities”;
•
ensuring
that the Commission’s relationship with intelligence providers
should be
“one-way
only”;
•
ensuring
that public comment was “limited and restricted to the factual”,
leaving
“political
evaluations or comments that carry obvious political implications”
to the
Security
Council.
782.
The panel also
noted that “the longer inspection and monitoring activities
remain
suspended,
the more difficult the comprehensive implementation of Security
Council
resolutions
becomes”. This increased “the risk that Iraq might reconstitute its
proscribed
weapons
programmes or retain proscribed items” and, if that risk
materialised as a result
of the
absence of inspections, it “would have extremely negative
consequences for the
credibility
of international non-proliferation efforts in general, and for the
credibility of the
United
Nations and IAEA in particular”.
783.
The panel
added that it was:
“…
essential that inspections teams return to Iraq as soon as
possible. The current
absence of
inspectors in Iraq has exponentially increased the risk of
compromising
the level
of assurance already achieved, since it is widely recognised that
the
re‑establishment
of the baseline [of the status of Iraq’s activity] will be a
difficult
task. The
loss of technical confidence in the system could become
irretrievable.”
784.
The panel
concluded that the “effectiveness of the monitoring and
verification
regime”
depended on its being “comprehensive and intrusive” with the “full
exercise of
the rights
of full and free access set forth in relevant Security Council
resolutions”. At the
same time,
the mandate should be “carried out objectively in a technically
competent
and
thorough manner with due regard to Iraqi sovereignty, dignity and
sensitivities”.
785.
“Given the
difficulties experienced in the past” this was likely to require
“firm and
active
support by the Security Council”:
“To be
effective, any system has to be deployed on the ground, which is
impossible
without
Iraqi acceptance. How this acceptance will be obtained is the
fundamental
question
before the Security Council.”
172