Iraq's weapons programme arouses concern in UN bodies.

The General Assembly on 1 November expressed deep concern that since 1991 Iraq had withheld information from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) about its nuclear-weapons programme, in violation of its obligations under Security Council resolutions 687 (1991), 707 (1991) and 715 (1991), and stressed the need for Iraq to cooperate fully with the Agency in achieving the complete implementation of the relevant Council resolutions.

The Assembly took that action by adopting resolution 50/9 by a vote of 144 to 1 (Democratic People's Republic of Korea), with 8 abstentions. The text was adopted following the defeat, by a vote of 95 to 8, of an amendment proposed by Iraq, by which the Assembly would have noted that the IAEA report had stated that Iraq's nuclear-weapons programme had been, for all practical purposes, destroyed, removed or rendered harmless.

Under Council resolution 687 (1991), the Director General of the IAEA had been requested to carry out inspections in Iraq to determine the scope and status of its clandestine nuclear-weapons programme and to destroy, remove or render harmless materials and equipment specified in that resolution.

IAEA Director General's report

Introducing its annual report (A/50/360), IAEA Director General Hans Blix said that the Agency had recently received additional information on Iraq's former nuclear-weapons programme. "What can be concluded at this stage is that Iraq's withholding of information, documents and materials clearly constitutes a breach of Iraqi obligations under the Security Council resolutions and that the crash programme was in violation of the safeguards agreement" and the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), he said.

The IAEA reported that during 1994 it had carried out five inspections in Iraq and had destroyed, removed and rendered harmless items requiring such action under Council resolutions.

In another report of 14 December (S/1995/1040), Mr. Blix stated that in August 1995 Iraq had given the Agency a number of documents pertaining to its 1990 crash programme to divert highly enriched uranium, contained in research reactor fuel that was subject to IAEA safeguards, for use in its clandestine nuclear-weapons programme.

Those and other documents that Iraq claimed had been concealed on property belonging to the family of General Hussein Kamel (Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's son-in-law who had defected to Jordan) had been catalogued and transferred to IAEA headquarters in Vienna for analysis. They consisted of almost a million pages.

During follow-up inspections in September and October 1995, Iraq had handed over additional technical documents relating to its nuclear-weapons programme, which were being urgently evaluated by the IAEA, the report added. Those documents contained detailed lists of equipment and materials utilized in the clandestine nuclear-weapons programme that had been salvaged during and after the Persian Gulf War and removed to other locations.

Special Commission report

On 17 December, the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM) monitoring the disarmament of Iraq reported (S/1995/1038) that that country's attitude towards cooperation with the Commission and the Council had "changed from one where ultimatums with deadlines were delivered to one of promises of complete cooperation and transparency, without time-limits".

The Special Commission was set up under Council resolution 687 (1991) to supervise the disposal of Iraq's biological, chemical and missile capabilities and to cooperate with the IAEA with respect to the disposal of its nuclear-weapons programme. Its report stated that Iraq had admitted it had not taken all actions required of it under resolution 687, but insisted that its declared policy now was to do so as fast as possible.

Iraq had also admitted that as late as August 1995, it had been withholding important information from the Commission, but was now in the course of disclosing what had been concealed, the report added. After having maintained for a number of years that all documentation relating to its proscribed programmes had been destroyed, Iraq had provided the Commission and the IAEA with substantial quantities of documentation and was continuing to do so.

On 16 November, Iraq had submitted to the Special Commission more than 2,500 pages of declaration, in which it had given details of its dealings with its main foreign suppliers in the missile area. It had also confirmed that it had used a large radar in proscribed activities. That radar had been destroyed by the Commission under protest.

Iraq had not provided original documents to account for the expenditure of all imported proscribed missile systems, the report added. Its account concerning missile warheads, including those for the delivery of weapons of mass destruction, lacked consistency and the necessary evidence for verification. For example, Iraq had not given any evidence to support its claim concerning its production figures for indigenous warheads, and there were significant gaps in its accounting for such major components for operational missiles as guidance and control systems, liquid propellant fuels and ground support equipment.

The Commission was still studying the full, final and complete disclosures with respect to the material balance in such areas as imported and indigenously manufactured missile components and equipment for production activities. However, it believed that Iraq was still withholding important documents related to proscribed activities, the report stated.

In view of those major deficiencies in such disclosures, Iraq's insistence that the document submitted on 16 November was the final and formal disclosure would complicate the verification process. The Special Commission would, however, work as quickly as possible, without sacrificing thoroughness, to verify Iraq's declaration.

Iraq had recently admitted that after the adoption of resolution 687 it had conducted a covert programme to develop and produce a surface-to-surface missile, which would be capable of prohibited ranges, the report added. If further investigation proved that to be correct, there would have been a clear violation of that resolution.

In the area of chemical weapons, Iraq had acknowledged it had produced more VX agent than had previously been declared, the report revealed. It had earlier stated that only 260 kilograms had been produced in 1988, but had now admitted that 1.8 tonnes had been produced and a further 1.5 tonnes in 1990. It had stated that purity and stabilization problems had caused the programme to be abandoned in 1990 in favour of producing Sarin and Cyclosarin.

The Special Commission had conducted its first night-time inspection of a chemical site and was to expand the chemical analytical capabilities of the Baghdad Monitoring and Verification Centre, the report said.

In the area of biological weapons, Iraq had provided in November a draft declaration following on from its earlier disclosures that it had a comprehensive offensive biological-weapons programme. However, the draft contained major deficiencies in structure and content. Serious gaps and omissions existed in the declaration and in the documentary support.

Evidence available to the Commission had established that the biological weapons programme was more extensive than Iraq had admitted. Moreover, the information in the draft did not match the Commission's findings in a number of important aspects. The Commission continued to believe that important documents were still being withheld by Iraq, despite assurances of full cooperation from its Government.

Action by Sanctions Committee

The Security Council Committee set up under resolution 661 (1990) to monitor sanctions against Iraq had proposed (S/1995/1017) a mechanism on notification by both Iraq and its supplier States of planned supplies of dual-use items to Iraq and on inspection of those items at the end-user site.

In a 6 December statement, Sanction's Committee Chairman Tono Eitel of Germany said that the export/import mechanism had been designed to complement other elements of ongoing monitoring and verification in order to create an effective system with minimal additional costs for legitimate trade and industry.

UNIKOM 

Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali appointed Major-General Gian Giuseppe Santillo of Italy as Force Commander of the UN Iraq-Kuwait Observation Mission (UNIKOM) effective 1 December 1995. He succeeded Major-General Krishna Thapa of Nepal.

On 4 October, the Security Council accepted the Secretary-General's recommendation that UNIKOM be maintained, citing its contribution to calm on the Iraq-Kuwait border.

UN Compensation Commission

The UN Compensation Commission at two meetings in Geneva approved more than $3 million worth of claims by persons affected by the Persian Gulf war of 1990-1991.

At the eighteenth session of its Governing Council (9-11 October), the Commission approved some $771 million for 217,513 claimants from 67 countries and three international organizations filing Palestinian claims.

At its nineteenth session (11-13 December), it decided to pay $2.45 million to 719 claimants in category B (serious personal injury and death). The only category B claims pending are those of approximately 550 missing persons, mostly Kuwaitis, whose fate is still unknown.

UN Guards

Two UN Guards, from Poland and from the Philippines, were killed in northern Iraq on 7 December and a third from Nepal was injured when a fuel oil tank exploded while they drove past a gas station in Shaqlawa, 55 kilometres north-east of Erbil. The matter was being investigated. There were 152 UN Guards serving in Iraq before the accident. The Guards constitute an innovative approach to security issues arising out of the implementation of the Humanitarian Programme conducted in northern Iraq.