Security council votes to speed up aid to Iraq

The US Security Council tonight voted unanimously to extend Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s authority to speed millions of pounds of additional food and medicine to the Iraqi people until June 3.

In an effort to get aid to Iraq quickly, the council on March 28 authorised Annan to review €14.45bn in contracts already approved under the UN oil-for-food programme and give priority to those that could be used immediately for humanitarian relief.

It empowered Annan to take practical decisions about the contracts for 45 days, but UN officials said the May 12 deadline was too short.

Benon Sevan, who runs the oil-for-food programme, urged the council to extend the secretary-general’s mandate until June 3 to try to get more aid into Iraq.

He told the council that UN agencies had identified over €404m in priority humanitarian contracts that could be transported to Iraq before the May 12 deadline.

If the deadline was extended until June 3, an additional €115m worth of badly needed food could be delivered, Sevan said.

The council – divided over when and how to lift economic sanctions against Iraq – is united on the need for the Iraqi people to continue to receive the humanitarian goods provided under the oil-for-food programme.

Exactly how this will happen remains a subject of intense debate, and one with a deadline. The current six-month phase of the program, under which Iraqi uses oil revenues to buy food, medicine and other supplies, expires June 3.

The council’s 15-0 vote today will now give Annan authority over humanitarian contracts until that date.

Administrators of the programme said Iraqis will probably need help more now than before the war that ousted Saddam Hussein.

Prior to the war, more than 90% of Iraq’s 24 million people survived on the UN food basket and medical supplies; 60% used to sell part of their rations to pay for other essential needs, because it was their only source of income, Sevan said.

“If anything, with the current uncertainties and difficulties, the Iraqi people will be even more dependent, unless there is quick economic recovery,” he said.

The oil-for-food programme was suspended on March 17, two days before US-led forces invaded Iraq.