Making Iraq a Basket Case

By Stanley Heller, 7 June 1996

To shut up critics of the deadly UN sanctions on Iraq, the UN Security Council (i.e. the Clinton Administration) closed an oil for food deal with the Iraqi government. It will guarantee that deaths from malnutration and disease will continue though at a less grisly scale.

The Iraqi tyrant had resisted this deal for a long time, but he has been under increasing pressure. The final blow was the successful US campaign to cut business dealings by Jordanians with Iraq. The New York Times on January 25 reported that Jordan had cut its business with Iraq in half, to just $500 million a year.

The agreement in no way brings adequate relief to the Iraqi people. The money is far too little. Iraq used to export $15 billion a year in oil. This UN plan lets Iraq sell just $4 billion worth of oil over a year. From this amount, 30 % will be taken out to compensate Kuwaitis, 15% will be deducted for Iraqi Kurds and 10% will be given to the UN itself. So, of the $4 billion in oil that it sells, Iraq gets to keep only $1.8 billion. [It may even be less than that. Iraq will have to spend $200 million to repair and maintain the oil pipeline. The UN may force Iraq to take this expense, too, out of its oil profits.]

Last fall>s FAO report said Iraq immediately needed $2.7 billion just for food. Even counting the $600 million going to Iraqi Kurds, the amount Iraq gets to keep is hundreds of millions of dollars less than what>s needed to end malnutration. Children, the old and the sick will continue suffer the most fatalities. Since there>s not enough money to cover minimal food requirements there>s obviously no extra money for medicine. The Iraqi government could only buy more medicine by accepting a smaller cut in the malnutration death rate. It should be recalled that much of the need for medicine is to counteract those suffering from sewage diseases. These are ailments caused by untreated sewage or unpurified water, conditions that were created by the Allies thorough warfare or sanctions.

It also must be remembered that the money raised by the oil sale can be used only to buy medicine, health supplies, foodstuffs and materials and supplies for essential civilian needs. It cannot be spent to fix the Iraqi water purification and sewage systems. It cannot be spent to revive Iraqi farms, industry or transportation. So Iraqi agriculture will continue to decline. [Wheat production dropped 10% in 1995]. Iraq will have to wastefully import food that it could grow itself.

The oil for food deal will allow more Iraqis to live and this is certainly good, but if the UN sanctions are not repealed Iraq will remain a basket-case economy indefinitely. Its oil will be slowly drained away while the country remains completely destitute and stagnant. Resolution 986 is a sop to public opinion, and a way of making money for Kuwait. It covers up the fact that the Security Council intends to go on killing Iraqi children.