YouSaid · the spoken record

Hasan

lines on the record: 106
first: 1999-02-22
most recent: 2016-12-20
sittings or episodes: 10
sources: un-security-council

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“I also ask for the protection of other minorities to prevent the recurrence of genocide and the enslavement of women. There is a need to evacuate more than 4,000 immigrants from Turkey and other countries, who currently live in very difficult conditions, and to give the Yazidis, particularly those who have been victims of slavery, opportunities to immigrate, as Germany has done. There are 100,000 displaced persons and refugees in camps in Kurdistan. Despite the liberation of Yazidi areas, they have been unable to return and need the Council's support given their humanitarian and health problems. They need to be provided with consistent support to face the problems of genocide and sexual enslavement. We encourage the International Criminal Court to investigate those crimes.”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“More than 3,000 women and children were freed by various means through the help of an office of the Government of Kurdistan entrusted with the affairs of kidnapped individuals and others. The Yazidi religious leaders adopted a declaration facilitating the reintegration victims and their provision of special assistance. We are very grateful, but there are more than 3,000 abducted women who are not treated as prisoners of war. but used as sexual slaves, shared and exchanged among fighters. We understand that the international community has expressed sympathy for our plight, but it must act to stop the genocide and to protect our women so that they do not become objects of such slavery. To ensure the freedom of more than 3,000 Yazidi women who remain in the hands of Da'esh, I request that Yazidi areas be protected.”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“If the international community does not provide us with protection, other groups will commit similar crimes and once again thousands of women and girls will become sexual slaves. We cannot compromise with the honour and dignity of our women and girls. I would ask members to imagine for a few seconds that their son or daughter became the object of a lucrative trade by terrorists or was brainwashed and became a terrorist. Those are very sad images, but unfortunately we them experience every day. That is the reality we witness daily; it is a twenty-first century reality. Our women and our children are brought to slave markets, much like in medieval times. How can the human conscience stand for that? More than 6,500 Yazidi women were abducted but no military operation was carried out to free them. Where is justice?”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“We are facing a perniciousphenomenon that affects all States, including those that are stable and democratic. We need only consider the terrible attack yesterday in Germany and the murder of the Russian Ambassador in Turkey, committed in cold blood while the terrorists shouted religious slogans. The international community must eradicate terrorism and eliminate its sources of financing. Da'esh could not commit all those massacres without support. The Yazidis are victims who have paid a very heavy price and been forced to leave the countries where they have lived for thousands of years. Some have been freed, but genocide has been committed and the Council has been unable to stop it. When selected areas have been reopened, we find the mass graves of Yazidi men, women and even disabled people. Yazidis have often been the victims of murder.”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“The virginity of our girls has become the portal to paradise, according to the laws and ideals of Da'esh. The majority were presented as presents during Da'esh festivities or religious competitions. What Da'esh is doing is based on extremist precepts based on fatwahs and religious texts within Islamic jurisprudence. We know that Islam also contains moderate ideas and principles, but the worst part is that Muslim political and religious leaders have remained silent in the face ofwhat Da'esh is doing. That has led to our sadness and fear. There is no clear fatwah stating that the murder of the Yazidis or non-Muslims is a sin. There is no fatwah that clearly states those who commit such crimes are infidels. There is no such fatwa. We have heard no clear expressions of sympathy from leaders.”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“For two years, four months and eighteen days, our women and girls have been sold in slave markets and have been subjected to sexual slavery and the slave trade in the worst phenomenon of modern history, because Da'esh has taken us back to the age of slavery and the slave trade, where a twelve-year- old girl is sold for a pack of cigarettes. Those crimes are an embarrassment to humankind. The international community remained silent in the face of all that has happened and is happening still. Since 3 August 2014, the suffering of Yazidi has continued. Women, in particular, and indeed, Yazidi mothers have to choose between being raped themselves or having their own children raped before their very eyes. That is how we are treated by Da'esh.”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“At the outset, I would like to extend my most heartfelt thanks to the Spanish delegation for having invited me today to talk about an important subject that is ravaging the members of my community. I will open with a phrase that I heard on several occasions after the black day of the attack on the Yazidi region of Sinjar on 3 August 2014. It is a phrase told to me over the phone by a Yazidi in the hands of Da'esh: "I beg you to tell the authorities that if they cannot liberate us, they should bomb us." That phrase still reverberates in my ears, as that sad and terrified girl told it to me. That phrase, which I heard on subsequent occasions as well, from other Yazidis, was uttered in vain. Indeed, the terrorist organization Da'esh abducted over 6,500 Yazidi women and children.”
2016-12-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.7847 (2016) · source
“The problem resides in the threat to the sites held sacred by a billion Muslims and a billion Christians. Palestine is part of the Arab nation, one of the oldest and noblest nations a nation on whose land religions and cultures have coexisted and which has given birth to one of the oldest and most noble civilizations in history. It is a nation that has a tremendous capacity to face challenges and greed, and to prevail over invaders, such as the Zionist entity, as it did once against the Moguls and the Crusaders. We expect the international community to stand by that nation in its just battle.”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The problem is the military occupation of the Palestinian territory and the flow of adventurers into that land from Europe and the rest of the world under the pretext that it is a land without a people. The problem is the repeated acts of aggression perpetrated by that usurping entity against the Arab States and its occupation of the Arab territories, including the occupied Arab Golan. The problem resides in the tragedy of a people under occupation against whom all forms of repression are being practised. The problem is the suffering of more than 4 million Palestinian refugees who were pushed out of their land and who look back upon it as their homeland; they have the full right to return to it. The problem is in the Zionist creed- a racist, expansionist, arrogant and hateful creed.”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“To the contrary, the present situation should provide an additional incentive to them all to study the core of the matter and seriously to seek radical solutions that would restore the rights of those who rightfully possess them. The problem is not how we can push the Palestinians into unequal negotiations with the forces of occupation, forces which will certainly not restore their rights to them. What is needed is to study the core of the problem in order to find the appropriate solutions. The problem started in 1917, when a Briton named Balfour promised another Briton named Rothschild the establishment in Palestine of a national homeland for Rothschild and for other extremists like him.”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“It also gives its blessing to that entity's aggression against Arab States. That unlimited support to Israel began with its establishment 52 years ago, and it will continue so long as the Security Council reflects the interests of the Power that dominates and controls it. We say this not to discourage honourable members of the Council or to discourage other States Members of the United Nations which, in their statements yesterday and today, have expressed their very strong commitment to the principles of the Charter and their genuine wish to put an end to the injustice inflicted upon the Palestinians and to the Arab nation.”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Can it avenge those who have suffered and punish those who have wronged them? Some previous speakers have expressed the hope that the Security Council would adopt the measures necessary to put an end to the injustice inflicted upon the Palestinians by the forces of occupation and that the Council would hold the criminals responsible. Unfortunately, the facts would suggest that those speakers will be disappointed; such action will be impossible because of the balance of power that has obtained in the Security Council ever since its establishment, and because the dominant Power in the Council - the United States of America - extends all possible support and protection to that iniquitous entity, Israel, and provides it with all means of destruction, including nuclear weapons.”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The desecration by the perpetrator of the Sabra and Shatila massacres, the terrorist Ariel Sharon, of the holy Al-Haram Al-Sharif on 28 September 2000, and the subsequent use by the Zionist occupation forces of their military machine, including tanks, helicopters and missiles, against Palestinian civilians in order to suppress Palestinian anger, have thus far caused the death of more than 60 martyrs, among them the child Mohammed Jamal Al-Durra - whose name means "pearl", and who is indeed a pearl among martyrs - and they have caused the wounding of more than 2,000 others. This proves the aggressive nature of the Zionist entity and presents the international community and the United Nations with a genuine challenge. Can the international community, this time, defend what is right?”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Mr. Hasan (Iraq) (spoke in Arabic): I wish at the outset to congratulate you, Sir, on your assumption of the presidency of the Security Council for the month of October. We hail your wisdom and your determination, which have enabled States Members of the United Nations to state their views at this open meeting on a most important item that goes to the very core of the maintenance of international peace and security. The Council is meeting today to discuss the repression and aggression to which the Palestinian people are subjected not only in the territories occupied in 1967 but also in those occupied in 1948. That repression and aggression are blatant violations of international law, of international humanitarian law and of the Geneva Conventions of 1949.”
2000-10-04 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4204Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Since the imposition of comprehensive sanctions against Iraq was in contravention of the provisions of the Charter - starting with its Preamble, which stresses Members' faith in fundamental human rights and in the dignity and worth of the human person - it is the legal and moral duty of States Members of the United Nations to renounce participation in the implementation of resolutions that are inconsistent with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations and that are being used to carry out a policy of genocide against the children of Iraq. The children of Iraq, like all other Iraqi civilians, bear deep wounds on their hearts and their minds. Seven thousand Iraqi children perish each month as a result of the sanctions regime that has been imposed in the name of the Security Council. Will the Council remain silent?”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“We would therefore expect such an initiative to come from the States of the world, which have authorized the Security Council to act on their behalf. Those States should reconsider that authorization, because we now have evidence that it has been misused to kill the children of Iraq. The Council must be reminded that Article 25 of the Charter stipulates that the Members of the United Nations agree to accept and carry out the decisions of the Security Council in accordance with the Charter.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“There can be no further doubt that this principle of international humanitarian law has been materially and morally violated. The principle of permitting no impunity for those who disregard international humanitarian law must be applied. Those who target children must be brought to justice. The Security Council, in whose name the sanctions were imposed, unquestionably lost its credibility when it agreed to lend bogus legitimacy to a scheme in which Iraqi civilians would be considered enemy targets. Because of the United States insistence on maintaining the sanctions against Iraq to attain its own vicious political objectives, and because of its constant threat to use its veto power, the Council has been rendered unable to rectify the situation and to lift the sanctions against Iraq.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Apply this economic, peaceful, silent, deadly remedy and there will be no need for force. It is a terrible remedy." The same mind-set was also to be expressed in the words of Mrs. Madeleine Albright, Secretary of State of the United States, who famously said in 1996 that the death of half a million Iraqi children was a price that was "worth it" in continuing the sanctions against Iraq. Drawing a distinction between combatants and civilians is a key principle of international humanitarian law. The comprehensive sanctions imposed against Iraq target civilians. The United States and the United Kingdom bear full responsibility for the genocide that is being committed in gross violation of international humanitarian law.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The chief victims of the no-fly zones, the aggression and the relentless daily bombing are the children of Iraq, as has been demonstrated in reports by United Nations representatives who visited residential neighbourhoods in Iraq that had been the targets of bombing. Besides the actual bombing, the noise of supersonic military aircraft flying over Iraqi cities and villages causes panic and other psychological problems in children. At the dawn of the new millennium, the time has truly come for the international community to wake up and reject the mind-set of imposing inhuman comprehensive sanctions, which is a legacy of the Dark Ages. That mind-set was manifested in the well-known words of United States President Woodrow Wilson: "A nation boycotted is a nation that is in sight of surrender.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Those facts and figures are further proof that the economic sanctions that the Security Council imposed against Iraq constitute an act of systematic genocide. Fifthly, since 1991, the United States and the United Kingdom have been unilaterally enforcing no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq, engaging in a flagrant abuse of force against an independent State before the very eyes of the United Nations and of the entire international community. Indeed, to deflect attention from their own internal crises, they stage empty military heroics and commit military aggression against Iraq, most recently the large-scale aggression against Iraq that took place between 16 and 20 December 1998.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“According to the UNICEF field study, the infant mortality rates have increased from 56 per 1,000 live births during the period 1984-1989 to 131 per 1,000 in the period 1994- 1999. This is in addition to the death of one million Iraqis of other age groups, especially women and elderly. Of the children who survive, some 25 per cent suffer from chronic malnutrition. School enrolment has declined. Mrs. Rossing, the UNICEF Regional Director in Iraq, announced on 21 July 2000 that nutrition in Iraq was not a problem in the 1980s, but this problem appeared in the 19905 only. She added that the sanctions had extensively hurt children, many of whom were forced to leave school and go on the road to earn their living, which would have a negative impact on the country's future human resources.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“This means that the primary victims are the children of Iraq. Also, the use of depleted uranium has contributed to environmental pollution in terms of air quality, soil, water and plants. The rate of pollution has increased ten-fold over normal levels.Estimates of expenses to clean the Iraqi environment are now at some 375 billion dollars. Fourthly, following the systematic military destruction of Iraq, comprehensive sanctions still remain. The cumulative impact of the sanctions has been on the civilian population, especially children. The field study conducted by UNICEF and issued in August 1999 emphasized that the sanctions on Iraq have resulted in the death of half a million Iraqi children under the age of five.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Ahtisaari wrote, most means of modern life support had been destroyed or rendered tenuous, and Iraq had for some time to come been relegated to a pre-industrial age, but with all the disabilities of post-industrial dependency on an intensive use of energy and technology. Thirdly, the United States and the United Kingdom exploited the Security Council resolutions as an opportunity to test a new radioactive weapon made of depleted uranium missiles. They dropped on Iraq a total of 300 tons of this weapon of mass destruction. The use of this weapon resulted in the death of 50,000 Iraqi children in the first year. Furthermore, the use of this radioactive weapon would have a long-lasting effect on future generations in Iraq, including a higher incidence of cancer, especially leukemia among children, and fetus deformation and forced abortions.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Here, let me recall what was stated by the former United Nations Under-Secretary-General, Mr. Marti Ahtisaari, who visited Iraq in the wake of the aggression as head of the United Nations humanitarian needs assessment mission. In his report, in document S/22360, he stated that nothing that they had seen or read had quite prepared them for the particular form of devastation that had now befallen the country. The recent conflict had wrought near-apocalyptic results, he said, upon the economic infrastructure of what had been, until January 1991, a rather highly organized and mechanized society. Now, Mr.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Until today, the United Kingdom and the United States put on hold contracts for the acquisition of ambulances and medicines that would save the lives of children under the pretext of dual-use materials. Secondly, five months after the imposition of comprehensive sanctions, Iraq, under the cover of Security Council resolutions, was the target of the most horrendous military aggression known in contemporary history. A total of 88,000 tons of ordnance were dropped on Iraqi cities and villages, equivalent to seven or eight nuclear bombs similar to those dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Those bombs and missiles destroyed, among other things, schools, playgrounds and hospitals for children. They also destroyed an infant-formula factory which the Americans claimed was a biological weapons factory.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The claim by some that the suffering of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children is an unintended result arising indirectly from the sanctions is made in total ignorance of the facts on the ground and total disregard of moral values. The comprehensive sanctions imposed on Iraq were designed to kill as many Iraqi children as possible. Since they were imposed, those sanctions have not achieved any other objective except that. Let me cite the following data. First, the comprehensive sanctions imposed on Iraq by resolution 661 (1990) of 6 August 1990 did not exclude in reality even foodstuffs and medicines. Later, children's textbooks, clothing, toys and even their coffins were excluded.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“25) The Secretary-General suggests the dispatch of evaluation missions to the targeted States and neighbouring countries prior to the imposition of sanctions with a view to assessing the potential negative impacts of sanctions. My delegation supports this recommendation and hopes that it would constitute, along with other recommendations submitted by several States, a basis for restricting the use of Article 41 of the Charter of the United Nations, to keep it exclusively within the purposes of the Charter and to prevent the use of sanctions as a means of mass killing, as in the case of sanctions imposed on Iraq, sanctions which targeted the civilian population, chiefly children.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“In his report on children in armed conflict before the Council, the Secretary- General has devoted a special section to the issue of protecting children from the impact of sanctions. He expressed his deep concern over the adverse impact of sanctions on children and emphasized that "The potential long-term benefits of sanctions should be weighed against the immediate and long-term costs to children, including the collapse of health and education infrastructures, reduced economic opportunities, increased child labour in informal sectors and increased infant morbidity and mortality. The suffering of Iraqi children, as reported by UNICEF, and of children in the Balkans are troubling cases in point." (S/2000/712, para.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The North has come to monopolize wealth, power, influence and technological dominance, leaving the States of the South with poverty, illiteracy, starvation, unemployment and disease. All this provides fertile ground for the growth of bigotry, violence and conflict. Thus, the United Nations has an important role to play in correcting these imbalances in the current international environment. The indiscriminate and excessive application of sanctions by the Security Council ever since the United States achieved dominance over it in 1990 has had catastrophic consequences in several third world targeted countries. Children have been the primary victims of these sanctions.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“While there is an urgent immediate need for modalities to alleviate the suffering of children in conflict areas and to reinforce commitments to international conventions in the area of child protection, it is equally pressing to consider a comprehensive approach to protecting children over the long term. Perhaps the optimal way to protect children in armed conflict lies in preventing armed conflicts in the first place, containing them and addressing their root causes, foremost among which is the unstable and unbalanced international political and economic climate, which is characterized by hegemony and by a deepening divide between the States of the North and those of the South.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Before I address the substance of the issue, I wish to emphasize that the Security Council's discussion of this issue should in no way prejudice the competence and terms of reference of the General Assembly and other United Nations organs. Given the fact that the protection of children involves a wide range of issues, the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council are the appropriate forums for conducting more comprehensive and in-depth discussions of these matters. The report of the Secretary-General and the views expressed by Member States at this meeting will undoubtedly help to identify an approach towards a more forward-looking, integrated strategy to end the suffering of children in armed conflict.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Mr. Hasan (Iraq) (spoke in Arabic): At the outset, I wish to extend to you, Madam, and to the friendly delegation of Jamaica our thanks and appreciation for convening this meeting to discuss the important subject before us. I also thank the Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Mr. Olara Otunnu; Ms. Carol Bellamy, Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund; and the International Committee of the Red Cross for the important work they have been doing to protect children. I express my special appreciation for the vigorous campaign being waged by Mr. Otunnu to end regional sanctions imposed on Burundi, given their unjust repercussions on children and families. We hope that Mr. Otunnu will undertake a similar initiative on behalf of the children of Iraq.”
2000-07-26 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4176Resumption1 (2000) · source
“It is a destructive policy whose real purpose is not to establish peace and stability in the Balkans, but rather to further the expansionist political interests of certain influential international parties at the expense of the peace and stability of the Balkans and ofthe territorial integrity of its States. Peace in the Balkans will come about through respect for the United Nations and through serious- minded, direct dialogue among all parties in the region. What is required is a comprehensive outlook regarding all elements of the crisis, with a View to resolving it. Moreover, the international community must provide impartial and sincere assistance in bringing peace and stability to the Balkans.”
2000-06-23 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4164Resumption1 (2000) · source
“In the wake of the military aggression against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, we saw the persistent use of other forms of aggression: attempts to bring about isolation and exclusion; the imposition of sanctions; and interference in the internal affairs of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, including threats to its territorial integrity. At this very meeting we heard the representative of the United States of America call upon members of the Council to meet with the representative of one of the entities of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. That amounted to a call for the partition of an independent State and blatant interference in its internal affairs. It also set another grave precedent in the work of the Security Council.”
2000-06-23 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4164Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The NATO aggression led by the United States against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on 24 March 1999 struck a hard blow for all the efforts by the international community to solve the crisis. It was also a hard blow for the Charter of the United Nations, as well as the rules of international law and the authority and prestige ofthe Security Council. The Secretary-General was right to say that the use of force without Security Council authorization jeopardized the essence of the collective international security system based on the Charter of the United Nations.”
2000-06-23 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4164Resumption1 (2000) · source
“So why is the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, an independent State and a Member of the United Nations which is directly concerned with this particular matter, an exception here? The current situation in the Balkans is characterized by fragile balances in all political, military and economic matters. The events of recent years have proved that any foreign intervention that has suspicious intent, and any violation of the Charter of the United Nations - particularly of the principles of respect for the sovereignty of States, non-interference in the internal affairs of States and the inadmissibility of the use or the threat of the use of force in international relations - have further complicated the situation in the Balkans.”
2000-06-23 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4164Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Articles 31 and 32 permit a Member State of the United Nations, as well as a non-member, to take part in discussing any issue that is before the Security Council and which particularly affects its own interests. On the other hand, preventing the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from taking part in this meeting happened at a time when there is a proliferation of hearing sessions and open meetings held by the Council. Whoever is interested in taking part in these meetings is allowed to, ranging from the representatives of the rebels in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to Senator Jesse Helms, who lectured the Council at length, disdaining the Charter of the United Nations.”
2000-06-23 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4164Resumption1 (2000) · source
“Mr. Hasan (Iraq) (spoke in Arabic): I would like at the outset to extend my sincere thanks for organizing this open debate meeting today. We had hoped that this meeting would be really open to all those who are interested in participating. However, and unfortunately, we were surprised by a practice that is very difficult to explain- namely, preventing the representative of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Ambassador Jovanovic, from taking part. This practice does not allow this open debate to realize its objective, because a major viewpoint is already absent from this debate. Raising the issue of the succession of Yugoslavia as an excuse to deprive the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia of the opportunity to take part in this meeting is an illogical excuse and is not in harmony with the Charter of the United Nations.”
2000-06-23 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4164Resumption1 (2000) · source
“The nuclear weapons programme was completely eliminated. The long- range ballistic missile programme was completely eliminated. All that was left was the research and development and manufacturing capability for missiles with a range of less than 150 kilometres, a permitted activity. Everything we set out to destroy in 1991. The physical infrastructure had been eliminated. So if I had to quantify Iraq's threat in terms of weapons of mass destruction, the real threat is zero, none."”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“The latest testimony to that effect comes in the statements made by the former inspector, Mr. Scott Ritter, to the journalist John Pilger in a programme aired by the British ITV channel on 6 March 2000. A copy of the videotape has been distributed to Security Council members. Scott Ritter, certainly no friend of Iraq's, stated the following: "In 1991 Iraq had significant capability in areas of chemical weapons, biological weapons, nuclear weapons production capability and long-range ballistic missiles manufacturing capability. But in 1998 the chemical weapons infrastructure had been completely dismantled or destroyed by UNSCOM. or by Iraq in compliance with UNSCOMS's mandate. The biological weapons programme had been declared in its totality late in the game but it was gone. All the major facilities were eliminated.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“It has no basis in reality. Among other objectives, it is aimed at entrenching the sanctions and rendering them an objective in and of themselves. This is an attempt to rewrite the Security Council decisions and to turn Iraq into a permanent laboratory of sanctions regimes. Sanctions were imposed against Iraq through Council resolution 661 (1990) because of the events in Kuwait. Thereafter the issue of weapons of mass destruction was added in resolution 687 (1991). Iraq has satisfied the requirements of both resolutions. Iraqi forces withdrew from Kuwait on 28 February 1991. The issue of weapons of mass destruction has been settled for years. The now defunct United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) and the United States of America have been unable to provide one iota of truth to the contrary.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“Secondly, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, article 25, paragraph 1, provides that "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family". Thirdly, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, article 1, paragraph 2, provides that "In no case may a people be deprived of its own means of subsistence." Fourth is the 1949 Geneva Conventions and their Protocols. Article 54, paragraph 1, of the first Protocol provides that "The starvation of civilians shall not be used as a means of war." Fifth is the 1959 Declaration on the Rights of the Child and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child. Today some circles are floating the idea of replacing the current sanctions regime against Iraq with a smarter one. This call is ill-intentioned.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“In the case of Iraq, the United States has forced the Security Council to impose comprehensive sanctions that are in contradiction to many international treaties and conventions, including merely as an example, the Convention on the Prohibition and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, of 1948, which defines genocide as acts perpetrated with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical or religious group through the killing of individual members of the group, causing physical or psychological harm to members of that group or the imposition of living conditions on that group leading to its physical destruction in whole or in part. According to that definition, the comprehensive sanctions imposed against Iraq are a crime of genocide by any standard.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“It is regrettable that the current Chairman of the sanctions Committee on Iraq has preconceived positions vis-a-vis Iraq that reflect on the way he presides over the Committee. Sometimes he is more royalist than the American king himself. I do not believe that I am really telling any member of the Security Council anything new in this regard. When the Security Council imposes coercive measures against States, it must keep in mind the interconnectedness of international obligations and responsibilities according to international treaties and conventions which as a whole are an integral source of international law as well as international humanitarian law.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“Although limited, the proposed improvements in the recommendations found no reflection whatsoever in the sanctions Committee on Iraq. As an example, many international bodies, many humanitarian organizations and specialized agencies in the United Nations have submitted studies on the catastrophic effects of sanctions imposed against Iraq. However, it seems that the Iraq sanctions Committee was the last to listen. That Committee further continued to work behind closed doors, and because of a United States veto it refused to invite the Permanent Representative of Iraq to clarify Iraq's position vis-a-vis the issues before it. Furthermore, the Committee refused to provide its agenda or summary records to Iraq.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“However, those recommendations did not tackle the foremost problem, which is that the activities of these committees are based on the rule of unanimity. In practice, such a rule allows any member of a committee to exercise a veto, to prevent a decision agreed upon by the other fourteen members. This happens in contravention of the most fundamental rules of democracy, not to mention the principle of collective responsibility. Such a practice has allowed the United States of America to place a hold on $1.8 billion worth of humanitarian contracts under the oil for food programme, for political reasons to boot. Furthermore, that practice prevented the Committee from reaching agreement on many ways to improve its working methods.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“The working group also recommended that there be consideration of the grave negative effects of sanctions on the abilities and activities of targeted countries in the field of development; the Security Council should submit regular reports to the General Assembly on the status of specific sanctions regimes; measures should be adopted in response to the expectations raised by Article 50 of the Charter; and, finally, targeted countries should be enabled to exercise their right to express their viewpoint before the sanctions committees. Thereafter, the President of the Security Council prepared a note on 29 January 1999, document S/1999/92, recommending limited improvements to the working methods of sanctions committees.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“Foremost among them were the following: a specific time-frame should be set for sanctions regimes; the Security Council should precisely set out the steps to be taken by the targeted country for sanctions against it to be lifted; and efforts should be made to enable targeted countries to obtain appropriate resources and procedures to finance humanitarian imports. The objective of sanctions is to modify the behaviour of the country under sanctions, not to punish or otherwise exact retribution.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“An open-ended working group presided over by the Ambassador of Brazil, Mr. Amorim, was established, and the General Assembly adopted its recommendations in resolution 51/242 on 15 September 1997. It is truly regrettable that the Security Council failed to take up any of the working group's substantive recommendations aimed at reforming current or future sanctions regimes, and specifically the comprehensive sanctions imposed against Iraq. The group's recommendations remained a dead letter.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source
“Ambassador Amorim in his report concludes that the humanitarian situation in Iraq will remain in its painful condition unless considerable revival takes place in the Iraqi economy that, in turn cannot take place through palliative humanitarian efforts alone. Furthermore, many international reports have described the catastrophic effects of sanctions against Iraq in detail, including reports by specialized United Nations agencies such as United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), as well as by non-governmental organizations and also by those working in the field, including Mr. Denis Halliday, Mr. Hans Sponeck, Mrs. Burkhardt and, indeed, many others. In dealing with the lack of any checks in the Charter against the indiscriminate use of sanctions, former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali recommended a study of the issue.”
2000-04-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.4128 (2000) · source