The United States moved Monday, March 26, to enlist the support of France in its efforts to modify UN sanctions on Iraq without loosening restrictions aimed at curbing Baghdad's weapons programs.
Secretary of State Colin Powell and his French counterpart Hubert Vedrine said they had discussed the matter at length in their first intensive one-on-one meeting since the new US administration took power in January.
However, it was unclear from vague remarks offered by the ministers at a joint news conference whether Washington and Paris — long at odds over the value and enforcement of the sanctions — had found substantial new common ground.
"We agree that Iraq must honor its UN obligations," Powell told reporters after a formal meeting and working lunch with Vedrine. "(We) discussed how we can ensure that the UN sanctions are targeted at the Iraqi regime's attempts to develop weapons of mass destruction while sparing the people of Iraq from any suffering," Powell said.
The secretary, who is leading the US push to salvage the crumbling sanctions by reforming them, said Friday that he believed the United States and France were "closer" to agreement on the restrictions than they had been in some time.
And Vedrine, also speaking Friday, indicated he was pleased to see Washington's Iraq policy "evolving," adding that the change was common sense. But the French top diplomat was all but silent on the matter Monday after meeting Powell, confirming that they had spent "some time" talking about US ideas but declining to offer an assessment of them.
He did say that US efforts to forge a consensus on easing commercial sanctions while enhancing military and technological ones represented a "new period of reflection on sanctions on Iraq" but did not comment further.
Among the new ideas Washington hopes will be palatable to the increasingly uneasy international community are ways of enticing countries neighboring on Iraq, where smuggling operations are rife, to cooperate more fully in enforcing key embargoes.
New measures could include placing UN monitors just outside Iraqi borders to monitor trade and setting up of a list of oil companies officially allowed by the United Nations to buy Iraqi crude in order to prevent the Iraqi regime from obtaining financial kickbacks, according to US officials.
With tightened controls over Baghdad's trade and oil revenues, the plan would allow Iraq's neighbors to buy Iraqi oil at discounted prices with payments deposited into special accounts that Iraq could access to purchase imports from those same countries, stimulating lawful border trade.
Powell did not address the plans, first reported in the Washington Post, but senior officials confirmed they were elements in Washington's overall sanctions modification proposal.
In addition to Iraq, Powell and Vedrine discussed the situation in the Balkans with both offering firm support to the government of Macedonia as it battles ethnic Albanian rebels. Vedrine also urged the United States to be mindful of progress the new Yugoslav and Serbian governments have made when considering this week whether to certify Belgrade as eligible for US aid.
President George W. Bush has until March 31 to fulfill a congressional mandate to certify whether Belgrade has shown enough progress in democratic reform and adequate cooperation with an international war crimes tribunal to continue to receive US aid.
At stake is about half of a $100-million US aid package, and possibly Washington's support for multilateral support programs for Belgrade in the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
Powell and Vedrine also compared notes on US-European concerns, notable the European Union's plans for an enhanced security and defense identity which would include a rapid reaction force that Washington does not want to duplicate or supplant NATO.
The two also talked about controversial US plans for a national missile shield that many in Europe fear could provoke Russia and set off a new nuclear arms race. — (AFP, Washington)
by Matthew Lee
© Agence France Presse 2001
© 2001 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
