June 20, 2000
Excerpts from report by Iraqi radio on 20th June
Iraq has stressed that the United States and Britain have politicized the humanitarian oil-for-food programme since the first day of its implementation with the aim of inflicting more harm on Iraq and its people.
In a message dated 11th June and delivered yesterday by Iraq's permanent UN representative to the UN secretary-general, Kofi Annan, Foreign Minister Muhammad Sa'id al-Sahhaf called for efforts to use the surplus sums accrued after meeting the UN needs to buy the material and goods needed to fulfil the humanitarian needs of the Iraqi citizens instead of keeping these sums deposited in the UN accounts.
The message urged the UN Security Council to reconsider the percentages according to which the Iraqi funds are distributed to cover certain accounts. The message referred to many contracts suspended by the sanctions committee and stressed that all the contracts struck by Iraq were carefully studied by the UN General Secretariat and passed through all of its formalities. The message accused the US and British governments of obstructing these contracts under flimsy, illogical, and sometimes ridiculous, pretexts. The message gave the details of the suspended contracts and their values according to their sectors in the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh stages of the oil-for-food memorandum...
Al-Sahhaf called on the UN secretary-general to urge the Security Council to reconsider the percentages according to which Iraq's funds are distributed to cover certain accounts...
Foreign Minister Al-Sahhaf also called on Annan to intercede to redress this aberrant situation which is fabricated by the US and British governments and inform them of the need to stop pursuing the policy of harming Iraq and its people.
