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Russian plane: latest challenge to UN sanctions |
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September 24, 2000
BAGHDAD (AP) - A Russian airliner touched down Saturday in Iraq with a soccer team, musicians, businesspeople and medical supplies aboard in another challenge to 10-year-old U.N. sanctions that the United States and Britain are finding hard to keep firmly in place. Russia informed the U.N. sanctions committee of the flight, carrying 143 passengers and five tons of cargo, but did not seek permission from the committee to send the plane. Senior Iraqi officials, most from the Oil Ministry, were on hand to greet the plane. The flight was the latest challenge to sanctions on Iraq imposed after Saddam Hussein's army invaded Kuwait in 1990. A dispute over the controls has fractured the U.N. Security Council, some of whose members sharply disagree on the effectiveness of the sanctions. Russia and France, both permanent members of the Security Council, maintain authorization is not required for humanitarian flights. On Friday, France ignored U.S. and British objections in sending a plane from Paris to Baghdad - the first in a decade to arrive without U.N. permission. Iraqi officials view the flights as a sign U.N. trade sanctions imposed on Iraq for invading Kuwait are fizzling. They have so emboldened authorities that Abdulrazzaq al-Hashemi, a senior official welcoming the Russians, declared the government will turn down future requests to fly to Baghdad if those organizing the flight have obtained U.N. permission. Al-Hashemi, a senior member of the ruling Baath party, also said the increased flights indicate nations are distancing themselves from U.S. and British interpretations of the sanctions. Saturday's flight, he said, shows U.S.-British attempts to impose their will on others "are not succeeding." The flight arrived about 45 minutes late. Controllers at newly opened Saddam International Airport said Iranian authorities had denied permission for the plane to pass over their territory. The reason was not immediately clear, though Iraq and Iran fought a 1980-88 war and relations remain cool. The plane belongs to Russia's Vnukovo airlines whose representative in Baghdad, Alexei Badikov, expressed hope the countries will resume regularly scheduled flights within two months. Most of the passengers were businessmen with an eye on lucrative oil and trade deals under Iraq's U.N.-approved oil program. Entrepreneurs and journalists were among the Russian delegation, according to Russia's Itar-Tass news agency. Members of the Torpedo-ZIL soccer team based in Moscow also were aboard the plane and were to meet an Iraqi team for an unofficial match, the agency said. Medicines, disposable syringes and blood-transfusion kits were among the humanitarian supplies, according to Itar-Tass. Both France and Russia increasingly have become impatient with the sanctions regime. Russia is eager to resume lucrative oil contracts with Baghdad and wants Iraq to pay back some dlrs 8 billion in Soviet-era debt. France often has spoken out against the impact of sanctions on civilians. China, too, has been sympathetic toward Iraq, leaving the United States and Britain as the only permanent Security Council members trying to ensure sanctions intended to isolate Saddam remain in place. Russia says U.N. resolutions do not specifically ban passenger flights to Iraq, and Russia's state-controlled airline Aeroflot is negotiating with Iraq on resuming flights to Baghdad. Jordan, Iraq's neighbor, also is considering whether to resume passenger service. The United States and Britain vehemently oppose a resumptidad. |
