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RE: Anan quote from Irish times



> the irish times article at
> http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/2001/1022/wor16.htm
> contained this bit-
>
> Mr Annan had reported that "Iraq has made preparation of the distribution
> plan unnecessarily cumbersome, that it has declined to revise the
> distribution plan allocations, that it is responsible for slow contracting
> for essential supplies and has created considerable delays in the
> opening of letters of credit."
>
> Anyone know where and when Anan said this?

Hi Andrew,

When statements about the 'oil for food' programme attributed to Kofi Annan,
it is usually one of the 90 or 180 day reports that is being referred to.
These are submitted in his name, but not written by him; he doesn't usually
involve himself directly with the programme.

In this case, the report is the Phase X 90 day report.  To explain some of
this jargon: the 'oil for food' programme is organised in 180 day phases.
(No one seems to think that there are any advantages to this division.  Even
the US/UK proposals this summer would have abolished these periods; in the
end, they were kept, presumably because the US/UK wanted to keep this
concession in reserve to bargain with later.)  At the mid (90 day) and end
(180 day) points of each phase, a report is submitted in the
Secretary-General's name to the Security Council.  These form the core of
the publically available information on 'oil for food' and the humanitarian
situation in Iraq.  CASI's website has a list of them at
http://www.casi.org.uk/info/un.html#sg.  They invariably contain criticisms
of both the Iraqi government and the Security Council: both sides have
failed to take all the steps that they could have to improve matters.  The
claims made in the Irish Times are not direct quotes from the report, but
all seem to be taken from its first page.

Usually, the S-G's reports are accompanied by verbal presentations to the
Security Council by the Executive Director of the Office of the Iraq
Programme in New York (see http://www.un.org/Depts/oip/chron.html for the
links).  These have often allowed somewhat more pointed observations to be
made than those found in the S-G reports.  The Phase X 90 day report,
though, was released on 28 September (see
http://www.un.org/Depts/oip/reports/S2001_919.pdf), two weeks after the WTC
attacks.  Thus, the verbal presentation to the Council was allegedly
suppressed by the UN Secretariat: given the charged atmosphere, they did not
want to cause any further trouble.

I hope that this helps,

Colin Rowat

work | Room 406, Department of Economics | The University of Birmingham |
Birmingham, B15 2TT, UK | 0121 414 3754 | c.rowat@bham.ac.uk

personal | 07768 056 984 (mobile) | (707) 221 3672 (US fax) |
colinrowat@yahoo.com


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