On 20th Feb. 2001 The Guardian reported that the British Government was launching 'a new propaganda drive' in order to 'refocus the public debate' on Iraq, 'insisting that its people's suffering - including infant deaths - is of the dictatorship's own making.' Sure enough that same day The Daily Telegraph carried a piece by the Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, with the Orwellian title 'Why it is in the interest of the Iraqi people to bomb Saddam.' In what follows we examine some of Mr Cook's claims. All quotes in bold are taken from this article unless otherwise indicated.

1. 'Saddam alone is to blame for his people's suffering.'

Let's compare Mr Cook's assessment with that of the major human rights NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW). According to HRW 'The economic siege of the country has contributed directly to the general pauperization of the vast majority of people' (Jan. 2000, emphasis added) and 'the continued imposition of comprehensive economic sanctions is undermining the basic rights of children and the civilian population generally' (Aug. 2000). In a joint letter to the UN with Save the Children Fund UK, HRW stressed that 'the Council must recognise that the sanctions have contributed in a major way to persistent life-threatening conditions in the country' (Aug. 2000). Mr Cook seems unable to do this.

2. 'It is a myth that UN policy prevents the delivery of food and medicines.'

Whilst Iraq is permitted (subject to UN approval) to import food, medicines and 'supplies for essential civilian needs' it is a gross distortion to imply, as Cook does, that the supply of these goods has not been seriously affected by sanctions. It has. Initially this was mainly because the sanctions deprived Iraq of the foreign exchange it needed to purchase these goods. Today, it is the Sanctions Committee that obstructs the importation of these goods (see 8. below). Note that Mr Cook's focus on 'food and medicines' conveniently draws attention away from the fact, long recognised by the UN, that, 'genuine nutritional security cannot depend on food alone'. Kofi Annan says nutritional security in Iraq is affected by 'the deterioration in water and sanitation infrastructure', 'dilapidated health facilities' and 'reduced agricultural production.' (UN Secretary-General's Report, 1 Feb. 1998).

This basic point has been reiterated time and time again by the UN:

• In December 1998 the World Food Programme identified the 'main reason' for the ongoing nutritional crisis as the 'massive deterioration in basic infrastructure.'
• In an October 2000 Press Briefing, UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator for Iraq Tun Myat stated that 'the overall well-being of the people [of Iraq]' will 'not improve' unless 'the basics - housing, electricity, water and sanitation - [are] restored.'
• 'Until such time as Iraq's infrastructure for electricity and water and sanitation has been sufficiently rehabilitated, the Iraqi people will continue to be vulnerable to disease and hardship.' (UN Secretary-General's Report, Mar. 2001)

Human Rights Watch point out that the UN 'oil-for-food' programme cannot solve these problems: 'An emergency commodity assistance program like oil-for-food, no matter how well funded or well run, cannot reverse the devastating consequences of war and then ten years of virtual shut-down of Iraq's economy'.

HRW says the deterioration in civilian infrastructure is 'so far reaching' that 'it can only be reversed with extensive investment and development efforts.' (Press Release, 4th Aug. 2000, emphasis added). Exactly what economic sanctions prevent.

3. 'Over the last year, the UN has made about $14 billion available to Iraq for buying [humanitarian supplies].'

Actually less than $12 bn of Iraq's own oil revenues were available for such purchases in the year 2000 ('Basic Figures', www.un.org/Depts/oip). More importantly Mr Cook fails to mention how far this money goes. As we have seen, restoring the civilian infrastructure is essential to restoring public health. The Economist Intelligence Unit has conservatively estimated the cost of re-constructing Iraq's essential infrastructural utilities at $50 - $100 billion (EIU, 8th Mar. 2000), a figure that dwarfs Cook's inaccurate '$14 bn.'

4. '[$14 billion] is more than the government health and welfare budgets of Egypt, Jordan, Syria or Iran.'

A useless comparison for an obvious reason: Iraq's needs today are radically different from those of the other countries listed, none of which have been subjected to the devastating 'coalition' assault of 1991 and over ten years of economic strangulation. (During the war 85,000 tones of conventional bombs were dropped on Iraq and Kuwait in five weeks of around-the-clock attacks: the equivalent of five Hiroshima-size bombs). Before sanctions Iraq had spent decades developing: lowering levels of child mortality; improving literacy, sanitation etc ... Much of this progress has been destroyed by the 1991 Gulf War and ten years of sanctions.

5. 'If he chose to, Saddam could easily alleviate his people's suffering.'

In their March '99 report the UN Humanitarian Panel concluded that 'the humanitarian situation in Iraq will continue to be a dire one in the absence of a sustained revival of the Iraqi economy' something which, the Panel said, 'cannot be achieved solely through remedial humanitarian efforts' such as oil-for-food.

'Ending' rather than 'alleviating' the suffering of ordinary families in Iraq would be an 'ethical' foreign policy.

6. 'Why did Saddam order no medicines at all for six months at the end of last year?'

It is true that no contracts for medicines were submitted to the UN between June and November last year. However there was 'nothing sinister' about these delays - at least according to the current UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator for Iraq, Tun Myat.

Mr Myat told Reuters (30th Jan. 2001) that the 'real reason' for the slow pace of ordering was a new Iraqi law which eliminated the role of middlemen in supplying contracts under oil-for-food: 'Many ministries here took time to readjust their purchasing procedures, sources of supplies and identification of suppliers and this is probably the main reason why some of the ministries have fallen very badly behind.'

7. 'Why is more than $11 billion lying unspent in the UN's oil-for-food accounts?'

In a rare example of investigative journalism the Telegraph itself debunked this lie the next day. Anton La Guardia reported that 'A spokesman for the UN's Iraq Programme said about £2.8 billion was unspent, with the balance already ear-marked for projects approved by the UN' (emphasis added). Delays in contracting are real but not sinister (see 6. above).

8. 'To export most goods to Iraq... it is simply necessary to notify the UN.'

It is true that the UN now has so-called 'green lists' - lists of 'pre-approved' items which can just be notified to the UN and imported without specific authorisation from the Sanctions Committee. But at the same time, billions of dollars' worth of humanitarian goods are being blocked by Washington and London.

As at 23 March 2001 more than $3.7 billion worth of contracts had been processed under the 'green lists'. However, roughly the same number of contracts - valued at $3.39 bn - were 'on hold' in the UN Sanctions Committee. The high level of holds is 'one of the major factors' 'impeding' the implementation of oil-for-food in Government-controlled Iraq (Secretary-General's report, Nov. 2000). According to UN figures the US and Britain are responsible for 99% of the total value of all current holds.

9. 'Saddam Hussein is playing politics with suffering. In northern Iraq, where the same sanctions apply but where Saddam's writ does not run, people are better off than they ever were under his control ...' (Letter from Robin Cook to Peter Lilley, 29 Dec. 2000)

It is true that conditions in the autonomous Kurdish area, in northern Iraq, are better than in south/central Iraq, controlled by Baghdad. But UNICEF has stated clearly that the difference in child death rates between the north and south/central, for example, 'cannot be attributed to the differing ways the Oil for Food Program is implemented in the two parts of Iraq.' ('Questions and Answers for the Child Mortality Survey', August 1999).

The north has 50% of Iraq's productive arable land; has always had a better deal than the south/central region under oil-for-food; and is able to trade more freely through the border with Turkey.

According to the Foreign Office, UNICEF's surveys demonstrated 'that sanctions are not responsible for the suffering' in Iraq (FCO letter, 31 January '01). UNICEF UK, on the other hand, believes that sanctions are 'one important factor in the humanitarian crisis' (unpublished letter to the Guardian from David Bull, Executive Director of UNICEF UK, 4th August 2000).