Diplomatic Door Closes on U.N. Security Council

Amid recriminations and resignation, the diplomatic door closed Monday on the Security Council, and the United Nations began withdrawing inspectors and aid workers from Iraq in anticipation of a U.S.-led attack.

Despite last-minute appeals by the ambassadors from the United States, Britain and Spain, the council could not muster an eleventh-hour agreement on a resolution seeking U.N. backing for an attack against the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The measure died without a vote, while its opponents packed away their hopes of somehow stopping a war.

Speeches marked with deep disappointment Monday morning quickly slipped into blame. John D. Negroponte, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., and his British counterpart, Jeremy Greenstock, said France’s declaration that it would veto any ultimatum directed at Iraq “whatever the circumstances” had scuttled their efforts to win support for the resolution among undecided countries on the 15-member Security Council.

“We believed that 10 members of the council at one point or another were willing to support our approach,” said Greenstock. “But when they knew that there would be a veto, come what may, there was no need for them to work out whatever domestic or international cost there might be for them in supporting the U.S.-U.K. resolution.”

He pointed out that France had rejected Britain’s compromise proposals “even before the Iraqi government” had.

French Ambassador Jean-Marc de la Sabliere quickly replied that his nation was not alone in opposing a U.S.-led invasion to disarm Iraq.

“The draft resolution did not get the votes because the members of the council, the majority of the U.N. -- and, I would say, the majority of the people in the world -- do not think it would be right” to use force against Iraq, he said.

At times, the diplomats almost seemed to be in denial that four months of negotiations over the resolution were finally at an end. Even as weapons inspectors began to evacuate Iraq, France, Russia and Germany called for a meeting of foreign ministers to discuss the inspectors’ future work. Chief inspector Hans Blix handed a 30-page plan of key remaining tasks to the council president Monday afternoon and is scheduled to present it to the council Wednesday.

“It’s not over yet,” Russian Ambassador Sergei V. Lavrov said after the council abandoned the resolution. “We are still having discussions.”

But the 60 inspectors and 90 other U.N. staff members based in Baghdad began preparations to leave Iraq after receiving an order from Secretary-General Kofi Annan. U.N. agencies have been quietly reducing their personnel in the country in recent weeks by bringing people out for “leave” and not replacing them, but Annan had asked the U.S. to give him at least 48 hours’ notice of an attack so the world body could safely evacuate the hundreds of U.N. workers still in Iraq. He got the call from Negroponte on Sunday night.

Their departure means the halt of several crucial programs, said Annan. The U.N. will suspend its “oil-for-food” program, which distributes food and medicine that are paid for by the sale of Iraqi oil. About 60% of the nation’s 22 million people rely on U.N. rations as their main source of food and have been stockpiling food in preparation for war.

“This does not mean that, should war come to Iraq, that the U.N. will sit back and not do anything to help the Iraqi population,” said Annan. “We will find a way of resuming our humanitarian activities to help the Iraqi people, who have suffered for so long, and do whatever we can to give them assistance and support.”

Iraqi Ambassador Mohammed Douri reacted with anger and sadness to the implicit declaration of war against his country by the U.S. and Britain.

“They opt for war,” he said. “They opt to neglect the international community. They opt to reject the Security Council charter.”

Later, while fingering black prayer beads, he said: “We are human beings. We have to expect bad moments and better moments. This is a bad time for us, but we have to accept it and we have our faith.”

As ambassadors filtered out of the council, few would accept President Bush’s declaration that the U.N. had failed the test he put to the world body in September to disarm Iraq or be deemed irrelevant.

“I do not share the opinion that the U.N. will be irrelevant or less useful,” said German Ambassador Gunter Pleuger. “It is the only body that can provide legitimacy to international action.”

Pleuger said the U.S. will have to ask the Security Council for help in rebuilding Iraq, especially its oil sector.

But the council’s first mission will be repairing its deep rifts.

“The most important thing is that the Americans stressed today that they are willing to work through the United Nations,” said Pakistani Ambassador Munir Akram.”The U.N. still has a lot to do, and we believe that this way, through humanitarian relief, we can be part of the process of healing the wounds caused by the diplomacy.”