Security Council diplomats still unhappy with Iraq resolution

The new Anglo-American resolution on Iraq still does not properly spell out the new government’s sovereignty, UN Security Council diplomats said today.

The allies circulated a revised blueprint that would end their occupation and hand over sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government on June 30.

It gives the new government control of the Iraqi army and police, and would end the mandate for a multinational force by January 2006 – two major changes.

The changes addressed major concerns about the initial draft from several Security Council members, among them France, Germany, Russia and Chile.

“The development should make us optimistic,” said Karsten Voigt, the German Foreign Ministry’s top official for relations with Washington.

However, “the decisive point is not only whether the Security Council members can reach an agreement but that Iraqis on the ground get a strong feeling from its decision that they are really in control again now”, he said.

Some on the 15-member council still were not satisfied. Algeria said a final resolution must clearly give the Iraqis final say over the multinational force.

“We still need to have language that would say that the Iraqi government’s point of view will prevail over the MNF (multinational force) in case of major military operations,” Algeria’s UN Ambassador Abdallah Baali said.

France, Germany, Russia and Chile also raised questions during closed-door Security Council discussions, diplomats said.

“We are not satisfied with the new version,” a French diplomat said. “We need clarification.”

China’s Ambassador Wang Guangya said the restoration of “full sovereignty has not been fully reflected” in the text. That view was echoed by French Ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere, according to the French diplomat.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari was heading to New York to press for full sovereignty, and he was expected to meet the council tomorrow.

US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said he believed Washington had addressed most of the international community’s concerns.

The original draft resolution endorsed a timetable under which elections for a transitional national assembly would be held by January 31, 2005, a constitution adopted during 2005 and a new Iraqi government elected by December 31, 2005.

The draft said the mandate for the multinational force in Iraq would be reviewed after a year or even earlier if the transitional government that takes power after January elections requests it.

That remains in the revised draft, but new language puts an expiration date on the mandate for the multinational force – the installation of an elected government, which isn’t expected until December 2005 or January 2006.

The new version notes for the first time “that the presence of the multinational force in Iraq is at the request of the incoming interim government.” It doesn’t specifically give the new leaders the right to ask the force to leave, though US and British leaders have said they will go if asked.

Iraq’s new interim prime minister, Iyad Allawi, said yesterday that the multinational force will be asked to stay on and promised that Iraq’s security forces will be a ”pivotal partner” with coalition troops in the fight to restore security to Iraq.