Slipping Through Sanctions

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Slipping Through Sanctions

* Under the U.N. system, DVD players glide into Iraq while food and medical supplies get tangled up in red tape.

By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
TIMES STAFF WRITER
October 19 2001

BASRA, Iraq --

Inspectors with high-tech gear and a U.N. mandate charge around this southern port city, on this day examining ships loaded with beans and rice to make sure they are not concealing electronics, or chemicals or even weapons, banned under the strict sanctions imposed on Iraq a decade ago.

But at a nearby pier docks the Jabal Ali, a passenger liner that cruises between this impoverished city and the oil-rich United Arab Emirates. The inspectors never so much as glance at its cargo--even though it frequently holds smuggled goods, according to merchants and local officials.

The sanctions regime imposed on Iraq is supposed to allow delivery of humanitarian goods under a U.N.-administered "oil-for-food" program--and keep out anything with a possible military application. But inspectors have no authority to check ships or trucks transporting anything that is not designated as part of the program. So essential items such as food, medicine and parts to rebuild the country's water and electricity systems get caught up in red tape, while computers, DVD players, microwave ovens and other banned wares glide right in. "You can buy anything you want here if you have the money," said George Sommerwill, a spokesman for the U.N. program in Iraq. "A lot of stuff available is clearly outside the oil-for-food program."

The selective nature of the sanctions has helped change Iraq's image from dangerous aggressor to hapless victim, particularly among the millions of Muslims who blame the West for their own grinding poverty. Islamic extremists such as Osama bin Laden frequently cite Iraq to justify terrorist campaigns against the United States--which they say has terrorized the Iraqi people.

With U.N. Security Council authorization for the sanctions set to expire next month, many Iraqi and non-Iraqi officials here believe that the Bush administration plans to use its war on terrorism to push for their renewal.

The United States has lobbied for tough sanctions against Baghdad since the Persian Gulf War, but it has also recognized difficulties with the program. This summer, it pushed to create "smart sanctions," designed to clamp down on smuggling while bringing in humanitarian goods more quickly. Iraq was strongly opposed, arguing that the plan would in effect make sanctions permanent, and blocked its adoption with the help of Russia.

Sanctions have succeeded in stopping President Saddam Hussein from rebuilding his military machine wholesale. But non-government workers and foreign diplomats here point to mounting evidence that the program has empowered the regime it was meant to bring down, harmed civilians and failed to stop the import of materials useful to the military.

"Sanctions are hitting the population, generations of people, having a devastating effect on society," said one diplomat based in Baghdad, who preferred not to be identified because of his country's close ties to the U.S.

Once a prosperous oil town, Basra today is a crumbling Third World dustbin. Raw sewage runs into the streets and contaminates tap water. Electricity is intermittent. Refrigeration is achieved with huge blocks of ice sold on the roadsides. Sheep graze in piles of trash, and barefoot children run around the dusty streets.

The Basra Pediatric and Maternity Hospital is a collection of all that ails this city, one of Iraq's largest. Children fill the wards suffering from diarrhea, vomiting and malnutrition. Sanctions have made it impossible for the hospital to receive a steady stream of the basic supplies it needs to treat these illnesses. Even if advanced medical equipment became available, the enforcers of the oil-for-food program would be obliged to strip out any powerful computer component needed to run the devices.

Zahraa Ehsan is 45 days old. Her mother, Eman Lattif, 31, is malnourished, so she supplemented her breast milk with formula--mixed with contaminated water from her home sink. The child vomits and has diarrhea, easily treated with the proper rehydration equipment. Instead, the intravenous line running to her tiny foot is intended for an adult, the valve spills fluid onto the floor, and the doctor cannot properly regulate what the infant receives. Pediatric instruments are not available.

"We have problems with supplies," said Dr. Abdul Karem Subber, deputy director of the hospital. "We have a problem with water because of lack of instruments to sterilize water and because of a lack of sanitation systems."

A few miles away, the inconsistency of the sanctions program comes into view: At one of the local ports, at least 20 huge cargo ships are lining up to bring products into Iraq. This is not the Umm al Qasr port, where purchases made under the oil-for-food program undergo daily inspections--and may become subject to delays that can last years. This is a "private" port, where goods are received outside the sanctions regime.

Iraq considers these legal imports, and charges the appropriate duties; the U.N. views them as illegal but has no authority to intervene. Officially, it is the duty of exporting countries to control smuggling into Iraq.

These deliveries have brought luxury items such as high-end electronics and late-model Jaguars and BMWs into the country. They have also allowed Iraq to rebuild its air-defense system in the south, U.S. officials say. U.S. and British planes patrolling the southern "no-fly" zone established after the Gulf War have recently stepped up strikes in the Basra region, citing hostile actions by the Iraqis.

But if the initial goal of the no-fly zone was to protect locals, the people here say they would be better off if sanctions were lifted instead of bombs dropped.

Al Dear Nehran Omar is a village a few miles outside Basra. Three thousand families live there, in a collection of cracked mud-and-concrete homes. Ducks wade in waste water. Since the Gulf War, there has been no fresh water or sewage system.

Three times this year, the houses in the village have been rattled by U.S. and British bombs, according to villagers who presented scraps of twisted metal they said were shrapnel from the attacks. No one was injured, as the bombs fell a good distance away. But the children get so nervous when they hear loud noises, they cry, shake, even vomit, according to their parents.

"I was playing behind the house," said Hamza Abba, a squeaky-voiced 6-year-old with a faded Mickey Mouse shirt and thick scabs on his nose and cheek. "I heard a very big noise and ran. I fell down and hurt my face."

"It is getting difficult to cultivate the earth," said Aqeel Hamza, 24, a local farmer. "We are afraid."

Even before Iraqi occupiers were driven from Kuwait by a U.S.-led coalition, the U.N. Security Council put a noose around the Iraqi regime in the form of sanctions. Security Council Resolution 661 prohibited any imports or exports except food or medicine. That meant Iraq could not sell any of its oil.

After the war, the United Nations reported "an imminent catastrophe . . . if minimum life support needs are not met rapidly." The Security Council in August 1991 offered Iraq the chance to sell oil as long as the proceeds would be controlled by the U.N.

Hussein rejected the proposal and tried to go it alone. But conditions grew so bad that, five years later, he agreed to the oil-for-food formula. Eventually, a spending cap was lifted and Iraq was allowed to use the program to rebuild its devastated infrastructure, including water, electric and sewage systems.

Since 1996, the program has sold more than $35 billion in oil. But only $11 billion in goods were actually distributed in the country, according to the United Nations. About $14 billion in goods has been approved, some of it as much as three years ago, and is slowly working its way through the system.

Some U.S. officials say Iraq is undermining the program to use the suffering of its people as a public relations tool. Humanitarian supplies are stockpiled instead of distributed, they charge, and Iraq has not used all the money available to buy more. But Sommerwill, the U.N. spokesman, said the "government of Iraq is cooperating."

The problem is more one of structure and bureaucracy, he said. Under the oil-for-food program, one-quarter of the cash raised goes to pay war reparation claims. About 3% goes to cover U.N.-related expenses. The remaining money is to be spent on Iraq. But it must wind its way through a tangled bureaucracy, including a committee that must certify that none of the commodities purchased with the money has a dual military use.

Since most items needed to rebuild the infrastructure--or in many cases, to provide health care--can have some dual use, about $4 billion in contracts, some going back to 1998, has been put on hold by the committee.

The delays in getting goods where they are needed has alarmed U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who in a recent report said he is "gravely concerned." The U.N. reports chronic problems in every sector of society. In agriculture, for example, the failure to release 850 tons of pesticides for fruit and vegetable production resulted in "a grave outbreak of whitefly" affecting thousands of acres.

At the same time, there is frustration among many here who witness the disparities. It is widely believed that Baghdad smuggles oil to Jordan and Turkey, bringing in $1 billion to $3 billion annually, while the U.S. looks the other way. One non-government official estimated that for every truck that comes across the border from Turkey under the sanctions program, 200 more cross with smuggled goods.

In Baghdad, the porous nature of the sanctions means that at the best surgical hospital in the country, Adnan Khair Alla Hospital, Dr. Layth Mumaiz can't find the artificial hip, knees or ankles he needs for Ibtesam Sahib, a patient in her 20s who is crippled by rheumatoid arthritis. Neurosurgeon Dr. Ari Sami won't be able to completely remove the baseball-size tumor from 2-year-old Zaman abu Rahman's head because he doesn't have a special surgical microscope.

But it also means that when Wamidh Nadhimi's children want to upgrade their home computer, he gives them some cash and they run out to a shop in Baghdad to buy the components they need. Their desktop system is running a Pentium II processor faster than anything found in the hospital.

Nadhimi is a Baghdad University political science professor who believes that, at least in the short term, sanctions have empowered the government by making all of Iraq's people dependent on it to survive. He also believes that the U.S. wants a way out.

Nadhimi would have his country seek a compromise--one that allows weapons inspectors in Iraq for a finite period of time in exchange for dropping the sanctions. But given the recent tensions, he is not optimistic a compromise can be found.

"If there is no compromise and if Americans achieve success in Afghanistan, I think in November and December they will deal with Iraq with a very heavy hand," he said. "Psychologically, America is not prepared to accept losing the war on sanctions."

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-- Cherri (jessam6@home.com), October 19, 2001

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