21 March 2000

Foreign & Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 2AH

 

Dear Stephen

Thank you for your letter of 8 March enclosing enclosing three from your constituent, Ronan T Dodds, of 4 Osborne Place, Palmersville, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Mr Dodds expresses concern about UK holds on humanitarian goods.  The UK is constantly reviewing the contracts it has on hold in the UN Sanctions Committee.  Holds are kept to an absolute minimum.  We have approved over 98% of all "oil for food" contracts.  Most holds we put on are because we require further information about the goods or their intended use/destination, or because the goods are dual use and we need assurances that their end-use will be bona fide.  These holds are lifted when the information or assurances are provided.  Security Council Resolution 1284, the comprehensive resolution on Iraq initiated by the UK and adopted by the Security Council last December, should ensure contracts are processed even more quickly than before. Better monitoring inside Iraq would also help.

We will not apologise for rigorously examining all contracts. We do this to uphold provisions laid down in Security Council Resolutions designed to ensure that Iraq does not acquire prohibited goods.

Mr Dodds asks for our view on the resignation of Hans von Sponeck. The UN programme is a unique and complex programme worth billions of pounds.  Administering it is a huge task, particularly when the government of Iraq does little to help and much to obstruct the UN's efforts.  It is a job for an experienced and dedicated administrator committed to making the most of the humanitarian programme in the interests of the Iraqi people.  In our view, Mr von Sponeck was not the right man for the job.  From very early on he made clear that he did not agree with the decision of the UN Security Council and he chose to focus his efforts on the campaign against sanctions rather than the implementation of the UN programme.

George Galloway's planned flight to Baghdad was not blocked.  We made an application for the flight to the UN Sanctions Committee on Mr Galloway's behalf.  The Committee approved the flight on 8 March.  We had earlier expressed concern about the number of passengers Mr Galloway was intending to take (207) and advised him that the Sanctions Committee was unlikely to approve the flight unless numbers were reduced.  Mr Galloway reduced the number of passengers to 29.

The FCO response intends to issue its response the International Development Committee report on sanctions in April.

It take it you will be seeking a response from the DTI on Mr Dodds's enquiry about yellow fever and diptheria vaccines.

Yours sincerely

Robin Cook

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