Global Policy Forum

By Marianna Belenkaya

Nezavisimaya Gazeta reports that Russian-American consultations on lifting sanctions against Iraq have begun in Geneva. The paper notes that Moscow is trying to persuade Washington to change its mind on the problem of Iraq, but the differences are too great.

"Both Moscow and Washington are developing their plans for lifting the sanctions against Iraq. The US promises to submit a 'smart sanctions' plan by July that would soften the embargo. Moscow believes the American plan aims not at removing sanctions, but at keeping them in place. Washington still harbors illusions about a change of regime in Iraq. The Russian diplomats' fears were confirmed when President Bush said in an interview that the aim of the revision of sanctions is to work out 'a more effective policy of isolating Saddam Hussein, impeding the programs of weapons we fear he is going to create'.

Although Bush dislikes Hussein he is not indifferent to the fate of the Iraqi people. Moscow believes that the easing of the sanctions regime by expanding the list of goods forbidden to be imported in Iraq and by creating a sanitary zone around Iraq, proposed by the Americans, is useless. The only way out of the situation, in the opinion of Russian diplomats that is shared in Arab countries, is the so-called package approach envisaging continued negotiations between the UN and Iraq to establish international monitoring of arms on its territory. If international experts fail to discover any signs of activities connected with banned military programs, the UN Security Council will have to lift economic sanctions against Iraq. This should go in parallel with the normalization of Iraq's bilateral relations with Kuwait and Saudi Arabia...

The only thing on which Moscow and Washington agree is that monitoring of Iraqi military programs is necessary. So, formal lifting of sanctions against Iraq is not yet on the agenda... But Russian-American consultations are still useful..."