Iraq, 1995

I am

pleased to begin my statement by extending to you sincere

congratulations on your election to the presidency of the

present session of the General Assembly. I am confident

that your high competence and profound experience will

contribute effectively to the success of the work of the

present historic session.

This session coincides with the fiftieth anniversary of

our Organization. There is no doubt that such an important

occasion calls for examining the course the Organization

has taken in order to draw the best object-lessons that

would enable the international community to proceed to the

building of a better future in which peace and stability

would prevail on the basis of justice, the balance of

interests of all peoples and genuine international

cooperation that would be free from selfishness and

hegemony; a future which would open the doors towards

the solution of economic, social, cultural and humanitarian

problems that continue to cause suffering to the

overwhelming majority of States, especially in Asia, Africa

and Latin America.

Members of the international community welcomed

the end of the cold war. They view it as the harbinger of a

new age. However, many representatives of many Member

States did point out the dangers of imbalance in

international relations. They warned that the supremacy of

one super-Power would make international life hostage to

that Power and, thereby, lead to the imposition of its views,

interests and policies on the rest of the world. The

correcting of this imbalance in the international situation

requires a great deal of care in upholding equality between

States, restructuring the United Nations in line with well-

balanced formulas, revitalizing the work of its institutions

in a manner that would ensure balance and genuine

participation in responsibility, prevent hegemony by one or

certain parties over the international community and over

the United Nations with its institutions. Although these

objectives have not been achieved so far, to work towards

their achievement and to develop an understanding of what

they involved continue to be urgent needs of the highest

priority.

We believe that the imposition of a unipolar

standpoint on the work of the United Nations totally

contradicts the purposes and principles of the Charter.

The persistence of such attempts would lead only to more

anxiety and deterioration in international relations.

This conviction stems from Iraq’s actual experience

over the past five years. It is an experience that relates to

the implementation of the resolutions of the Security

Council on the so-called Gulf Crisis, and especially the

implementation of resolution 687 (1991).

That resolution imposed upon Iraq a number of

obligations, as a basis for a comprehensive settlement of

the situation. A few days after the adoption of the

resolution, Iraq informed the Security Council of its

readiness to comply with the provisions of the resolution

despite the harsh nature of the obligations imposed

thereby. Since that date, Iraq has seriously taken upon

itself the implementation of the resolution in order to

normalize the situation at the regional and international

levels. In fact, a great many steps have taken place in

implementing the resolution. Our people hope that what

has been achieved will be the subject of an objective and

fair evaluation by the Security Council that would lead to

the lifting of the embargo imposed upon Iraq for more

than five years now.

Allow me to review very briefly the steps

taken by Iraq in the context of implementing the

obligations imposed by the Security Council in

resolution 687 (1991).

On 10 November 1994, Iraq officially recognized the

sovereignty, the territorial integrity and the political

independence of the State of Kuwait, and the international

boundary demarcated by the United Nations Iraq-Kuwait

Boundary Demarcation Commission. This was done in

implementation of resolutions 687 (1991) and 833 (1993).

Iraq has cooperated also with the representatives of

the United Nations in returning Kuwaiti property on the

basis of the lists presented through the United Nations

coordinator. In this connection, Iraq affirmed that it will

return any item of property that would be found when it

is established that it belongs to Kuwait.

As regards the prisoners of war and the missing

persons, Iraq, in implementation of Security Council

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General Assembly 21st plenary meeting

resolutions 686 (1991) and 687(1991), released all prisoners

of war and detainees who were in Iraq and repatriated them

in cooperation with the International Committee of the Red

Cross (ICRC). As for investigating the fate of missing

persons, we are cooperating fully within the framework of

the joint work carried out under the auspices of the ICRC

by the Tripartite Commission and its Technical

Subcommittee on Military and Civilian Missing Prisoners

of War and Mortal Remains. Since the middle of 1994,

when we found the appropriate modality for effective

technical work in dealing with this humanitarian problem,

we have sought within the said framework to provide

answers to the questions raised in the individual inquiry

files presented to us on the basis of the available

information. Moreover, Iraq has been receptive to all the

initiatives of States and personalities to find a quick

solution to this humanitarian problem in accordance with

the Geneva Conventions.

With regard to the subject of compensation, Iraq

accepted the principle of responsibility in accordance with

international law to compensate direct damage resulting

from the events in Kuwait as stated in resolution 687

(1991).

Iraq has cooperated also with the United Nations Iraq-

Kuwait Observation Mission (UNIKOM) in carrying out its

tasks and has extended every possible assistance to the

Mission with the aim of enabling it to perform its duties.

Iraq has affirmed its adherence to the 1925 Geneva

Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of

Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases and Bacteriological

Methods of warfare, and deposited the instruments of

ratification of the 1972 Convention on the Prohibition of

the Development, Production and Stockpiling of

Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on

their Destruction, in implementation of paragraph 7 of

resolution 687 (1991).

As for the implementation by Iraq of section (C) of

resolution 687 (1991), that is the provisions relating to

proscribed weapons, our relationship with the Special

Commission and the International Atomic Energy Agency

(IAEA) witnessed, in the middle of 1993, a turning point in

the field of positive and constructive cooperation in order

to finalize the implementation of the said section.

On 26 November 1993, we presented the official

response in regard to compliance with resolution 715 (1991)

relating to monitoring in the field of weapons.

In the process of work with the Special Commission

and the IAEA, we have not hesitated to offer all possible

assistance to facilitate the work, whether by presenting

information, available documents, details relating to past

programmes, the destruction of prohibited weapons, and

the setting up of an effective monitoring system. We have

been able to achieve substantive progress in this area, as

acknowledged by the Special Commission in its report to

the Security Council on 19 June 1995, and have taken the

final steps to complete the desired work.

These facts are well established in the relationship

between Iraq and the Special Commission and the IAEA.

The substantive nature of these facts cannot be distorted

by the campaign waged against Iraq by well-known

quarters because of special objectives of their own which

are totally alien to the objectives of resolution 687 (1991).

Despite all the propaganda, Iraq no longer has any

proscribed weapons, equipment, devices or materials, and

this is the essence of resolution 687 (1991). We affirm

our determination to continue our cooperation with the

Special Commission and the IAEA to close the weapons

file in accordance with the relevant resolutions and have

the embargo against Iraq lifted.

I should like to express here our deep regret

regarding the a priori ill-intentioned exaggerations which

cast a terrifying image of past Iraqi weapons programmes,

and the deliberate distortion of the fact that these

programmes were something of the past and that they no

longer exist. Raising fears in such a contrived fashion is

not an objective position at all. It is an attitude prompted

by political objectives which are far removed from the

concern over security and stability in the region and the

provisions of resolution 687 (1991).

Iraq has taken all these steps even while it has

continued to suffer the hardship caused by a total

embargo, the most extended ever imposed by the Security

Council in all its history. It is an embargo that embraces

everything and every aspect of life with the exception of

food and medicine. However, the freezing of Iraq’s assets

with foreign banks has prevented Iraq from using any of

those assets to purchase its needs of medicines and

foodstuffs and, thereby, has made the exception relating

to food and medicine devoid of any practical content. The

situation in Iraq has been aggravated by the actual

practice obtaining in the work of the Security Council

Committee established by resolution 661 (1990), which is

in charge of the application of sanctions against Iraq.

Work in the Committee proceeds along highly

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bureaucratic lines and follows the rule of unanimity. This

has provided certain States with an easy way to object and

thereby to reject a large number of export requests to Iraq

to meet civilian humanitarian needs, from pencils and

educational materials to automobile tyres and other simple

civilian provisions. All these matters are documented in the

records of the 661 Committee.

The deliberate insistence on prolonging the embargo

against Iraq is not linked to Iraq’s implementation of its

obligations. It is a systematic plan to inflict severe damage

upon Iraq and to deliberately destroy its infrastructure and

put paid to its developmental capabilities. This is a fact that

is known to all. The reports of the competent United

Nations Agencies operating in Iraq and of

non-governmental organizations concerned with relief

warned against the deterioration of the situation as a result

of the shortage of food and medicine, which threatens the

lives of millions of Iraqis, including thousands of children,

women and old people. In this connection, I should like to

refer to the last alert of the World Food Programme, issued

on 26 September 1995.

The report of the Secretary-General on the work of the

Organization, and his “Supplement to An Agenda for

Peace”, refer clearly to the problem of sanctions. We

should like in turn to draw the attention of Member States

to the fact that the application of sanctions against Iraq,

with such cruelty and bureaucratic complexity, calls for

questioning and scrutiny, in the interests of objectivity. We

are not sure that all the representatives in the General

Assembly know that the Security Council reviews the

sanctions regime against Iraq every 60 days, and that 27

reviews have been conducted to date without any easing of

the sanctions. The situation remains the same as it has been

since 3 April 1991, as if nothing had been achieved. Is this

a healthy situation?

The tragic consequences of the embargo have not been

limited to the food and health sectors in Iraq. The sections

of agriculture, education and environment also have

sustained grave damage, due to the shortages of materials

and the basic requirements needed for work in such sectors,

even at the minimum level required to satisfy the basic

needs of the civilian population.

The aggravation of this extremely difficult situation

has not prevented us from continuing to implement our

obligations under the relevant resolutions of the Security

Council. It is worth noting that, as is known to all, while

we were being called upon to implement our obligations,

and while we were deploying persistent efforts to do just

that, we have not received in return any objective and

equitable position that would have reduced sanctions

commensurately with the progress achieved by Iraq in

implementing the resolutions, or that would have given

encouragement and hope and given confidence that the

situation would be normalized eventually, in accordance

with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations.

The reality has been the very opposite. From the

very beginning and to date, we have been the target of

many threats; doubts have been raised about our

intentions; and we have been, twice, the target of armed

aggression. There has been considerable deceit with

regard to objectives. Pressure has been brought to bear on

any party that even thought of treating us fairly, even if

such fairness was not intended as a gesture towards Iraq

but as a means of safeguarding the credibility of the

Charter system and of the resolutions of the Security

Council. We have been accused of intermittent and

selective cooperation and of a lack of peaceful intentions

and lack of credibility, to such an extent that the levelling

of accusations by certain parties has come to resemble a

chronic pathological alignment. Such accusations have

been accompanied by the continued pursuance on the

practical level of policies aimed at interfering in the

internal affairs of Iraq in order to destabilize it; to

undermine its security, stability, the freedom of its people

and its sovereignty; and to try and change its political

system.

A super-Power has imposed upon my country two

no-fly zones, in the north and the south, without any legal

justification or authorization from the Security Council. It

has also exercised every means of pressure and deception

to perpetuate the harsh conditions caused by the embargo

against Iraq, while, at the same time, it conspires, quite

openly, to change the regime. Without any hesitation, its

officials declare that such is its intention. While all this

takes place, it is we who are asked to prove our peaceful

intentions and credibility.

It is no secret that the Power that leads the onslaught

I have spoken of against Iraq is the United States of

America. All the facts on the ground make it clear that it

is the United States of America and no one else that

should be asked to demonstrate its credibility, to prove

that its intentions are peaceful, and to desist from its

continuing acts of provocation, aggression and

interference in the internal affairs of Iraq and from

fomenting tension in the Gulf region under the pretext of

an illusory threat.

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President Saddam Hussein noted that the American

administration’s accusation that Iraq lacks credibility in its

relationship with the Special Commission is a false one,

and that it is the United States that does not have credibility

in dealing with States and international organizations.

Where is the credibility in the position of the United States

when it declares its determination not to lift the sanctions

against Iraq even if Iraq implements Security Council

resolution 687 (1991), of which the United States was the

chief author? Again, where is the credibility in the position

of the United States when the American administration

masses its naval and military forces in the Gulf and in the

Mediterranean under the false pretext that Iraq is planning

to attack Jordan, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia?

I do not wish to enter into polemics with the

representatives of the United States in the General

Assembly. But I find it necessary, with regard to the

American allegations about credibility, to raise certain

points of principle which call for serious thought and

contemplation. Before I do that, I should like to ask this

question: if it is important that the implementation of the

resolutions of the Security Council should be founded on

credibility, then how can allegations about the credibility of

Iraq be accepted at a time when the State which repeats

those allegations puts itself above the Security Council and

above the Charter and gives itself the right to interpret

United Nations resolutions and to arbitrarily draw

conclusions from such interpretations that agree with its

own selfish interests which are far removed from any basis

to be found in the provisions of the resolutions themselves?

While on the subject of credibility, where are the

efforts of the Security Council, and the United States in

particular, with regard to the implementation of paragraph

14 of Security Council resolution 687 (1991), which aims

at declaring the Middle East as a zone free from weapons

of mass destruction? This is an objective that has to be a

fundamental cornerstone of the edifice of peace, security

and stability in the region if such an edifice is to be built

on sturdy, well-balanced and equitable foundations. It is an

objective that acquires great importance from the standpoint

of the oft-mentioned credibility, since it is a known fact

that Israel possesses those weapons. Why does the United

States keep completely silent about paragraph 14, and why

has the Security Council not taken any action towards the

implementation of that part of its resolution? Does such a

blatant double standard have anything to do with

credibility?

Is it objective or even fair to imagine that the

obligations stipulated in Security Council resolutions could

be implemented in a natural fashion in the context of such

circumstances, atmospherics, and hostile policies directed

against Iraq?

Iraq is well aware of the fact that it is not in its

interest to conceal any information relating to past

weapons programmes, and that its interest lies in working

to lift as soon as possible the sanctions that are imposed

on it. Indeed, Iraq is acting in full conformity with this

objective. In this connection, we call upon member States

of the Security Council not to jump to any conclusions on

the basis of any unjust accusations levelled at Iraq,

because the right thing to do would be to wait for the

outcome of the work of the Special Commission, which

is responsible for evaluating the implementation by Iraq

of the Council’s resolutions concerning the proscribed

weapons.

We do not call for anything more than the legally

sound application of Security Council resolutions in

consonance with the purposes and principles of the

Charter, and not in line with the whims and aims of

unilateral policies of a certain State, which are founded

on the logic of naked power, opportunism, double

standards and the imposition of hegemony.

We believe that there is a collective duty to work

jointly with firmness in order to put things in the right

perspective in order to ensure the sound application of the

provisions of the Charter. The first step in this direction

requires us to ponder the philosophy of the sanctions as

created by the Charter. Is the sanctions regime a means

towards an end, or is it an end in itself? What is the

nature of the said regime? Is it punitive, or is it a means

whereby the purposes of the Charter should be achieved

without reference to the individual policies of individual

Member States?

It is well known to all that the sanctions regime

created by the Charter is nothing more than a means

aimed at achieving certain results which would ultimately

lead to the realization of the purposes and principles of

the United Nations as elaborated in Articles 1 and 2 of

the Charter, and that the means should cease to be applied

once the end has been achieved.

The competence of the Security Council to impose

sanctions is an exceptional means that is used when it is

established, objectively, that all other means of peaceful

settlement of disputes have failed. Such a means should

not be, however, a tool in the hands of a super-Power or

of a group of major Powers to achieve foreign policy

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goals at the expense of the common interest of Member

States.

It is now patently clear that the imposition of sanctions

on Iraq and the maintenance of the embargo against it, in

the well-known fashion, cannot be justified on the

substantive basis of the provisions of the Charter, because

it has become, in actual fact, an extension of the unilateral

policy of a super-Power that has made sanctions an end in

themselves and a vindictive means that serves its own

interests in the region.

In essence, the grounds for the imposition of sanctions

on Iraq no longer exist and, thus, the sanctions should be

lifted. But a well-known State obstructs the process.

We should like to say to the United States that the

solution lies in dialogue, which provides a mechanism for

the achievement of interests on a balanced and equitable

basis. This is what Iraq has called for and continues to call

for. The policy of hegemony and of creating crises cannot

but fail, because it is illegitimate and because the

international community rejects it. While this continues to

be our position of principle, we unfortunately find that the

United States statesmen ignore the realities of the region

and the needs and aspirations of its peoples, who yearn to

live in stability, peace and fruitful cooperation amongst

themselves and with the world as a whole.

At a time when we witness the tensions and internal

conflicts that prevail in the states of the region, and the

feelings of bitterness amongst their peoples as a result of

the current short-sighted policies, which recall to mind the

policies of the old imperialist Powers, we in Iraq should

like, from this rostrum, to call for the promotion of

relations of dialogue, understanding and good

neighbourliness amongst the States of the region, on the

basis of mutual respect, in accordance with the principles

of the Charter of the United Nations.

Iraq is an ancient country with a very long history that

goes back 7,000 years. The Iraqi people, who have

contributed greatly to human civilization, will remain in

control of their affairs, independent in their choices and

capable of overcoming crises.

We hope that Member States, especially the permanent

members of the Security Council, will make every effort to

interpret and apply the provisions of the resolutions of the

Security Council in accordance with their normal legal

meaning and not on the basis of whims and the political

interests of this or that State. Any course of action that

deviates from this principled rule would lead only to loss

of credibility and utterly undermine the principle of good

faith in the determination of international obligations.

The United Nations was established in order to

achieve the common goals of preserving peace, security

and stability in the world. The provisions of the

Organization’s Charter, in letter and in spirit, are founded

on the balancing of rights and duties and aim at

protecting the common interests of the international

community. Therefore policies that are based on the logic

of naked power and unilateral action outside the concepts

of the Charter, and that aim at achieving individual

objectives, are bound to contradict the very raison d’être

of the Organization and to contravene the letter and spirit

of its Charter. Such policies would only lead to the

marginalization of the Organization’s role in international

affairs.

It behoves us as we are about to celebrate half a

century of the existence of the Organization to rededicate

ourselves to honouring our undertakings as enshrined in

the Charter.