UNITED NATIONS
UNITED NATIONS SPECIAL COMMISSION
The Executive Chairman
22 July 1998
His Excellency
Mr. Sergey V. Lavrov
President of the Security Council
United Nations
Excellency,
I write to inform you, and through you, the members of the Security
Council of an incident which occurred during a recent inspection.
On Saturday 18 July an inspection team (UNSCOM 244) led by Ms.
Gabriele Kraatz-Wadsack sought to inspect the headquarters of the Iraqi
Air Force. This team's mission was to seek information and, in
particular, documentation to assist in verifying the disposition of
Iraq's chemical and biological weapons programme. UNSCOM 244 had been
proceeding relatively smoothly and Iraq had provided the necessary
access at previous sites. At this particular site Iraq declared it to
be sensitive. The expanded modalities for inspection of sensitive sites
were then employed.
During the inspection, the operations room of the Operations Command
of the Iraqi Air Force was declared especially sensitive by Iraq. Only
the Chief Inspector, one other inspector and an interpreter, were
admitted. In this room, they examined a safe containing a number of
files. One of the files contained a listing of munitions expended by
the Iraqi Air Force.
On examination, it became evident that, together with the
conventional munitions detailed, four particular types of other
munitions were included. They were denoted as "special." Those types
have been dec1ared by Iraq to have been used for chemical and biological
warfare agent delivery.
Obtaining a verifiable material balance of such non-conventional
munitions has been a high priority of the Commission. In this context,
Iraq has repeatedly denied the existence of any documents on this
subject. In fact, in its October 1997 report to the Security Council
(see table on page 11 of S/1997/774 dated 6 October 1997), the
Commission indicated that more than l00,000 filled special munitions
consumed in the time-frame 1981-1988, remained unaccounted for. No
documents or information on the consumption of such munitions has been
provided by Iraq.
The Chief Inspector initially decided that, rather than taking
possession of the document, a copy would be made. The senior Iraqi
representative present agreed that the document could be copied. He
later changed his mind, saying that the Commission's inspectors could
only take notes or copy the document with certain sections blacked-out.
This was unacceptable to the Chief Inspector who explained that the
Commission had the right, in accordance with Council resolutions and the
Plan for Ongoing Monitoring and Verification to examine, copy or remove
any record, data, information or documentation relevant to its
activities. The Iraqi representative then seized the document from the
Chief Inspector and said that the team could not view the documents
further. The Chief Inspector protested Iraq's decision and informed me
of the events.
I was subsequently telephoned by Gen. Amer Rashid, Minister of Oil.
While not prejudicing the Commission's rights as laid down by the
Counci1, I agreed to Gen. Rashid's proposal that the document in
question could be jointly sealed by UNSCOM and Iraq and stored in the
custody of Iraq's National Monitoring Directorate, pending my visit to
Baghdad (2 August - 5 August) when it could be reviewed by me and the
Deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Tariq Aziz.
Iraq's actions are in contravention of the Commission's fundamental
right to examine, to determine the relevance of and to remove any
document. As you are aware, resolution 707 (1991), paragraph 3 (ii)
"demands that Iraq allow the Special Commission, the IAEA and their
inspection teams immediate, unconditional, and unrestricted access to
any and all areas, facilities, equipment, records and means of
transportation which they wish to inspect." In addition, the
Commission's Plan for Ongoing Monitoring and Verification, endorsed by
resolution 715 (1991) (S/22871 Rev. 1), makes clear in paragraphs 2 (e)
and 5 (a) of Annex I that the Commission has the right to secure full
and free access at any time to material and other items, including
documentation which, in its judgement, may be necessary for its
monitoring and verification activities and also has the right to
request, receive, examine, copy and remove any record, data, information
or documentation. These rights which have been reaffirmed in
resolutions 1115 and 1134 (1997)) and Iraq's corresponding obligations
must be maintained. This is important not only for the Commission's
disarmament activities, but also if ongoing monitoring and verification
is to be effective and the Council can have confidence that Iraq is
fulfilling its obligations.
This incident, to which only a temporary solution has been found,
demonstrates the importance of inspections especially in circumstances
in which Iraq's claims are false and/or unable to be verified and, the
crucial nature of the rights the Council has assigned to UNSCOM.
I intend to recall those rights to the Government of Iraq during my
forthcoming visit and request again, that relevant documents, including
the one presently at issue, be provided to the Commission. I will keep
the Council informed of the outcome in this matter.
Finally, the provision of documents remains the most important step
Iraq can take to speed the completion of the necessary disarmament
tasks. The incident of 18 July was consistent with the point I made to
the Council on 24 June to the effect that UNSCOM is convinced that
highly relevant documents continue to exist in Iraq, in the possession
of the Government of Iraq.
Accept, Excellency, the assurances of my highest consideration.
Richard Butler
[signed]
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