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Here is my latest message to Mark Urban at BBC 2's Newsnight (no reply yet to my last one): Cheers Eric --- Begin Forwarded Message --- Date: Fri, 8 Oct 1999 15:23:29 -0400 (EDT) From: Eric Herring <Eric.Herring@bristol.ac.uk> Subject: Denis Halliday and Iraqi infant mortality Sender: Eric.Herring@bristol.ac.uk To: Mark Urban Dear Mark: I got in touch with Denis Halliday who, as you know, is former UN Assistant Secretary-General and Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq regarding your claim that UN personnel think that Saddam has ordered very little in the way of targeted nutrition for infants in order to keep Iraqi infant mortality rates high in order to have sanctions lifted. I was not in my office when he got back to me. He left the following message on my answerphone machine which I transcribed: 'Whereas for many years UNICEF had provided this infant feeding formula under its own resources, it was obliged to stop that practice when Oil-for-Food became in vogue recently. The Iraqi government finds this very hard to accept because it demands that UNICEF has an obligation towards Iraq as a founding member state of the United Nations and should provide this under its own resources. So that's the source of the conflict. And the stubbornness of the Iraqi government not to use Oil-for-Food, although the reason is absolutely legitimate and the purpose is legitimate, pending this problem of who is going to pay the bill: it's a matter of principle for the Iraqis, given the honour code, rights, self-esteem, sovereignty and so on that the Iraqis attach so much importance to. It's become really a redundant blockage to very urgently needed assistance. I've spoken to a number of government people and urged them to put that aside and buy the supplies under Oil-for-Food.' Of course, you - and UN personnel - are free to take the view that the arguments used by the Iraqi government are a smokescreen for some secret policy of keeping infant mortality high. However, I would like to see evidence rather than speculation in spite of the evidence. The bottom line is that your claim that this is the UN view in any general sense is untenable. Indeed, I have yet to find any current or former UN people who hold this view or say that they couldn't speak out on this because they were trying to maintain relations with Iraq. As I write, Denis is on his way to Baghdad and he has agreed to try to find out more information on this issue. In addition, I will make particular efforts to get in touch with Benon Sevan, who you say does think that there is a deliberate Iraqi policy of keeping infant mortality high. yours sincerely, Eric ---------------------- Dr. Eric Herring Department of Politics University of Bristol 10 Priory Road Bristol BS8 1TU England, UK Tel. +44-(0)117-928-8582 Fax +44-(0)117-973-2133 http://www.bris.ac.uk/Depts/Politics eric.herring@bristol.ac.uk --- End Forwarded Message --- ---------------------- Dr. Eric Herring Department of Politics University of Bristol 10 Priory Road Bristol BS8 1TU England, UK Tel. +44-(0)117-928-8582 Fax +44-(0)117-973-2133 http://www.bris.ac.uk/Depts/Politics eric.herring@bristol.ac.uk -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is a discussion list run by the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To be removed/added, email soc-casi-discuss-request@lists.cam.ac.uk, NOT the whole list. Please do not send emails with attached files to the list *** Archived at http://linux.clare.cam.ac.uk/~saw27/casi/discuss.html ***