UN spells out limits of US post-conflict rights
By Mark Turner at the United Nations
Published: April 3 2003 19:41 | Last Updated: April 3 2003 19:41
Mark Malloch Brown, head of the United Nations Development Programme, said on Thursday the US would have little choice but to return to the UN in establishing a post-conflict Iraq administration, stressing it had no international right to take over Iraq's oil industry, and warning that rebuilding costs would far exceed current oil revenues.
"Under the Geneva Conventions, [the occupying power is] only able to deal with day to day administration: you are not able to change the constitution, or make legal commitments going ahead many years," said Mr Malloch Brown.
"Sorting this out in a legally acceptable way drives you back to that little stuffy table [at the Security Council]: all roads lead you back to that," he said.
His remarks were the closest a senior UN official has come to a rhetorical broadside against US thinking on Iraq, and were an expression of frustration at the damage being done to economic and political development across the planet.
Peppering his remarks with caveats, but growing stronger as he warmed to the theme, Mr Malloch Brown warned of deep disquiet at the damage being done to the millennial development agenda of halving world poverty by 2015, as fuel prices went up, and tourism and investment fell. "All of that has at best been stalled; at most it could be reversed," he said.
While the UN was not seeking a role in Iraq - not least because half the world was still looking to it to "stop the conflict" - Mr Malloch Brown said political realities meant it was almost certain that the Security Council would come back together and build a common approach.
He warned of a scenario where "large parts of the country are disputed, there is a high level of intercommunal violence, where the US will not have any access". While Jay Garner, the US retired general expected to take over Iraq's administration, was "highly competent", the viability of unilateral plans had to be questioned.
"For every reason, everyone is going to want to be back round that table", but "it's going to take some time for everyone to recognise the incentives."
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