France Seeks Suspension of U.N. Sanctions

In a surprise move, France proposed Tuesday that the U.N. suspend economic sanctions against Iraq but continue to operate a version of its oil-for-food program.

The proposal appeared to be a conciliatory response to President Bush’s call last week to eliminate the U.N.’s 12-year-old sanctions against Iraq, which would free oil revenues for the rebuilding of the nation. But with France’s concessions also came conditions the White House is resisting.

Though France is willing to suspend the sanctions immediately, it still demands that U.N. inspectors certify that Iraq is free of banned weapons before trade restrictions are lifted permanently.

France and many other countries want to see the U.N. team verify any U.S. findings of banned weapons in Iraq, a process that would ensure that the U.N. plays a role in postwar Iraq.

France’s proposal calls for U.N. inspectors to join U.S. teams in the search for banned weapons, said French Ambassador Jean-Marc de la Sabliere.

“The lifting of the sanctions, which is, I think, the objective of all of us, is linked to the certification of the disarmament of Iraq,” De la Sabliere said. “Meanwhile, we could suspend the sanctions and adjust the oil-for-food program with the idea of phasing it out.”

Fellow opponents of the war in Iraq, including Russia and Germany, voiced support for the French proposal Tuesday, but the U.S. reacted coolly.

“Because of the dramatically changed circumstances within Iraq,” sanctions should be lifted entirely, said U.S. Ambassador John D. Negroponte. “We now need to work with France and other countries to see how best that can be achieved and how quickly.”

U.S. officials said they agree with France that the oil-for-food program -- which regulates oil sales and food distribution in Iraq -- should eventually be phased out but that the U.S. wants to control the process and the timetable.

The U.N. imposed sanctions on Iraq in 1991 to punish the Iraqi regime for invading Kuwait and to pressure it to surrender nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. The U.N. has controlled the country’s economy ever since, disbursing money from the nation’s oil sales to pay for nonmilitary goods and providing rations to a majority of its 24 million people.

The U.S. is eager for normal trade to return for Iraq in order to free up oil revenues to rebuild the country.

By merely suspending sanctions, France, Russia, Germany, Mexico and others would seek to keep the U.N.’s infrastructure in place to help counter U.S. dominance of postwar Iraq. In addition, they want to keep Iraq’s oil revenues in an escrow account under U.N. control until a new government is in place. The authority to spend the money would gradually be handed over to the new Iraqi leaders.

The French ambassador made his proposal after the U.N. Security Council met Tuesday with chief weapons inspector Hans Blix to help determine what the inspectors’ role in inspection and monitoring could be.

In the meeting, Blix noted that U.N. inspection teams have been working in Iraq for 12 years and have experience, databases and an aura of credibility that the U.S. may lack.

“I don’t see any adversarial relation. We’re all interested in finding the truth about the situation, whatever it is,” Blix said. “But, at the same time, I am also convinced that the world and the Security Council ... would like to have inspection and verification which bear the imprint ... of some institution that is authorized by the whole international community.”

The U.S. and Britain both say -- and Blix agrees -- that Iraq is not yet secure enough for the United Nations inspectors to join their teams in the search for weapons.

After the council meeting with Blix, Negroponte echoed a contention made Tuesday at the White House that the allied forces can handle the task without U.N. inspectors’ help.

“The coalition has assumed responsibility for the disarming of Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction,” Negroponte told reporters. “For the time being and for the foreseeable future, we visualize that as being a coalition activity.”

Washington has been frosty toward Blix and his teams, bristling at his declarations before the war that intelligence provided by the U.S. had “shortcomings,” especially one report that Iraq had tried to buy enriched uranium from Niger that proved to be a forgery.

U.S. officials charge that the Swedish diplomat, who will leave his post in June, was ineffective and inspected only 10% of the sensitive sites intelligence agencies had urged him to visit.

The allied forces are preparing about 1,000 inspectors from the U.S., Britain and Australia to inspect nearly 3,000 sites in Iraq and to interview scientists who have surrendered or been captured.

The Security Council is focusing on getting Iraq on its feet again. The council has temporarily transferred the Iraqi government’s authority to buy humanitarian goods to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.

On Tuesday, the head of the oil-for-food program, Benon Sevan, told the council that Annan’s authority should be extended until June 3, when the whole program is up for reconsideration.

In proposing the gradual phasing out of the program, France said it wants to guarantee that the equitable distribution of food continues and to ensure that Iraq’s money is used mainly for humanitarian needs.

For the council, the first step would be to get oil flowing again -- storage tanks in the Turkish port of Ceyhan are brimming with 9.3 million barrels piped from Iraq, but there is no authorization to sell it. Oil revenues would help revive the distribution of food, water and medicine that was interrupted by the war.

The U.S. would like to see a new resolution or series of resolutions sweep away the steps needed to lift sanctions required by previous council mandates. “We’re looking forwards, not backwards,” White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said several times during a briefing Tuesday.

Though France seemed to edge closer to the U.S. on Tuesday, the debate over the next resolution could result in strong disagreements. France and Russia could seek to use their veto power to leverage the best deals for their participation in Iraq’s rebuilding and to push for a more central role for the U.N. Other council members are seeking ways to keep the United States engaged in the U.N. while limiting its power in Iraq.

“The U.S. is acting as if the U.N. does not exist,” said one ambassador. “This position will suffice for the time being, but eventually the United States will lose a lot.”

Indeed, the United States is exploring ways to show the United Nations that it doesn’t depend on it, even to share the costly burden of reconstruction.

Pentagon officials said Tuesday that the administration intends to call a donor conference to assist with the rebuilding, but they stressed that no specific plans have been made.

“There is a plan to call for that,” said Lt. Col. Gary Keck, a Pentagon spokesman. “‘But as to exactly how that will happen, when that will happen and who will be involved, that’s not known yet.”

Keck said it is also “undecided” whether an effort to raise money for Iraq reconstruction would involve the United Nations. He said some countries have already pledged to provide capital assistance.

Britain has promised $130 million, he said. Australia has pledged $100 million, Japan $100 million and Spain $56 million.

Several other countries are offering other forms of assistance. Jordan is funding a field hospital, for example, while the United Arab Emirates has pledged a water purification system for Baghdad, a hospital facility, fuel and other supplies.

Keck could not say how much money and assistance had already been provided, how it was collected or how it would be disbursed. “Sometimes it’s the World Bank, sometimes special funds are set up,” he said.

At the Pentagon, the fundraising effort is being led by Dov Zakheim, comptroller of the Defense Department. He had a similar assignment after the war in Afghanistan, helping to raise about $2 billion for the rebuilding effort there.

“There’s tremendous interest in getting the Iraqis going because, let’s face it, the Afghan economy has been a subsistence economy,” he told Associated Press, “whereas Iraq is one of the few Middle Eastern countries that is blessed with both oil and water -- in great amounts -- which means that it has a naturally balanced economy.”

Zakheim said France, Germany and Russia have not offered assistance. He declined to say whether they would be welcome to do so.

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Times staff writers Sonni Efron and Maura Reynolds in Washington contributed to this report.