Global Policy Forum

By Edith M. Lederer

Despite a new resolution giving the United Nations a bigger role in Iraq, the organization won't beef up the skeleton staff still in the country after two bombings because of security concerns, a U.N. spokesman said Friday. A day after the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted the U.S.-backed resolution, spokesman Fred Eckhard said Secretary-General Kofi Annan isn't prepared under current conditions to send back more than 500 international staffers who were ordered to leave after the bombings in August and September. "The security situation does not permit us to send any additional staff into Iraq,'' Eckhard said.

The resolution requests the United Nations to play a role in the country's political transition from a dictatorship to a democracy "as circumstances permit.'' It calls on all 191 U.N. member states to contribute money and troops to help rebuild and stabilize Iraq and speed its independence. Annan has made clear that he would not risk sending U.N. staff back unless the United Nations was given a major political role in helping Iraq regain its sovereignty.

But he told the council after Thursday's vote that he would do his "utmost" to implement the resolution, bearing in mind "the safety and security'' of U.N. staff. The two bombings at U.N. headquarters in Baghdad killed 23 people - including Annan's top envoy in Iraq Sergio Vieira de Mello - and injured over 150 others.

European Union leaders on Friday welcomed the unanimous support for the resolution and urged that Iraqis be given self-rule according to "a realistic timetable." Islamic leaders urged a faster transition to full sovereignty for Iraq but dropped a plan to urge a greater role for the United Nations.

The resolution does not set a timetable for returning self-rule to Iraq, a significant flaw for several nations - chiefly France, Germany and Russia, who opposed the U.S.-led war to oust Saddam Hussein. Annan had also sought a timetable. The three countries also wanted the United Nations - not the U.S.-led coalition - to play the dominant political role in helping the Iraqi Governing Council draft a constitution and prepare for elections. But the United States said no.

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