02 December 1997
U.S. WANTS MORE EFFICIENT FOOD DISTRIBUTION FOR IRAQIS
(Richardson: "oil-for-food" program needs improving, not money) (970) By Judy Aita USIA United Nations Correspondent United Nations -- The United States will be working with the Security Council and the U.N. secretariat to improve the efficiency of the "oil-for-food" program which provides food and medicine to Iraqi civilians, U.S. Ambassador Bill Richardson said December 2. Speaking with journalists after a private Security Council meeting, Richardson rejected Iraqi charges that the U.S. is holding up the plans for the distribution of food and medicine and added that "we want to improve the efficiency ... the delivery and distribution methods" of the program." The Security Council's "oil-for-food" program -- often referred to by the number of the council's resolution, 986 -- was first authorized in 1995 but was not accepted by Iraq until December 1996. Under the program, Iraq is allowed to sell $2,000 million worth of crude oil every 180 days in order to buy food, medicine, and other humanitarian goods for Iraqi civilians affected by the seven-year-old economic embargo. The program and distribution is under strict U.N. supervision. The plan is up for renewal by the council on December 5. Richardson said that "the problem is that the Iraqis are sending some of the proceeds to their elite; they're building palaces instead of taking care of children." "We're ready to take a new look at the program ... to improve the efficiency of 986, the delivery and distribution methods," the ambassador said. Asked about the possibility of increasing the amount of oil that Iraq can sell, Richardson said that such a decision most probably will not be taken just yet, instead work will focus first on making the program more efficient. "We're prepared to study ways to make it more effective," Richardson said. Richardson said on the NBC-TV program Meet the Press November 30 that "Saddam in the past has blocked food and medicine to his own people. He is ready to victimize children, use them as human shields, use his people to be gassed, as he did before." "We are ready to send a message to the Iraqi people that we are ready to provide humanitarian assistance through a U.N. program. We don't have a beef with them ... we have a beef with Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi Government," Richardson said. The United Nations said that the Iraqi Government has close to $1,000 million unspent from the current phase of the program. After not accepting the program for several years after it was first offered by the council, Iraq now continually complains it benefits little from the plan and wants sanctions lifted instead. In September, the United States, Britain, and France presented a resolution to the Security Council to give Iraq more time to sell oil to purchase humanitarian supplies after Baghdad refused to sell oil in June and July. The three governments were concerned over the effect on needy Iraqi civilians dependent on humanitarian supplies the oil profits provide. Calling it a "technical fix," the resolution extended the first oil sale period of 90 days to 120 days to provide extra time for Iraq to sell the first $1,000 million worth of oil and shorten the second three-month period to two months. Thus, on the ending date in December, Iraq will have sold a total of $2,000 million worth of oil. In a written report to the council released December 1, Secretary General Kofi Annan said that despite the ongoing implementation of the oil-for-food program, "the population of Iraq continues to face a serious nutritional and health situation and there is an urgent need to contain the risk of further deterioration." Annan also noted an urgent need to undertake a systematic review of the whole process of contracting, processing applications, and approvals for procurement, shipment and distribution of the humanitarian goods. The secretary general suggested that the Security Council re-examine the adequacy of the revenues and to consider the possibility of increasing those revenues to meet Iraq's priority humanitarian requirements. But he did not recommend any amount for an increase. The Security Council must first decide what it wants to do or how much of an increase it wants. Then the U.N. secretariat will follow up with a plan on how to accomplish the council's goals. On December 1, White House spokesman Mike McCurry noted that about 95 percent of Iraq's 1,525 purchase requests have been approved by the Security Council's sanctions committee with about $1,240 million worth of supplies distributed. "We want to seek to expand that, consistent with the type of oversight that the United Nations needs to have to assure that these proceeds don't go off to the Republican Guards or elsewhere," McCurry said. While the U.S. believes the U.N. mechanism has been effective, the White House spokesman said, "we do believe there has been some leakage, but it's been minimal, thankfully." "We need some assurances, as that program was structured, that it would continue to be immune from any effort by Saddam Hussein or the elites in Iraq to siphon the proceeds of those sales off for their own personal benefit," McCurry said. McCurry also criticized Saddam Hussein for showing off needy children to the press. "It was a pathetic exercise for Saddam Hussein to put on public display people who are victims by his own hand, because he is responsible for the delay in putting in place the transactions and the monitoring framework by the United Nations that would allow some assurance that the proceeds from those oil sales would go to sick children and to hungry children," McCurry said.
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