Sir, - Recent letters from the UK Ambassador, Sir Ivor Roberts, on the UN sanctions on Iraq has provoked several responses from readers. I would suggest that those trying to justify these sanctions might reflect on the words of Patriarch Raphael the First of Babylon, head of the main Christian church in Iraq. "Killing a man in a forest is an unpardonable crime in law. Killing a nation, it would seem, is a matter of debate and perspective".
This week marks the 11th anniversary of the imposition of the sanctions on Iraq. The length of time the sanctions have been in place and their undoubted appalling impact have promoted a new debate on the morality of applying sanctions at all as an instrument of the United Nations in pursuit of its mandate to promote peace. It must be recalled that economic sanctions are just one step short of the ultimate sanction, military action. As such there is a strong argument that similar criteria to those used to justify warfare should be employed for the application of sanctions.
The UN Commission on Human Rights has had a working paper prepared on this issue by Mr Marc Bossuyt, a Belgian jurist. He proposes six criteria for evaluating sanctions:
1. Are the sanctions imposed for valid reasons - i.e., when there is a threat to, or actual breach of, international peace and security?
2. Do the sanctions target the proper parties? Sanctions may not target civilians who are not involved with the threat to peace or international security?
3. Do the sanctions target the proper goods or objects? Sanctions may not interfere with the free flow of humanitarian goods under the Geneva Convention and other basic provisions of humanitarian law.
4. Are the sanctions reasonably time-limited? Legal sanctions may become illegal when they have been applied too long without meaningful results.
5. Are the sanctions effective? Sanctions must be reasonably capable of achieving a desired result in terms of threat or actual breach of international peace or security.
6. Are the sanctions free from protest arising from violations of the principles of humanity and the dictates of the public conscience?
No matter where one points the finger of blame for the current humanitarian crisis in Iraq, it is clear that it is the imposition of sanctions that has created the context wherein the Iraqi nation is being slowly destroyed. The sanctions have been in place now for 11 years, and there is no end in sight. They have led to the death of 1.5 million people and the economic collapse of the country. And as their impact has become known to the wider world it has provoked an outcry of disapproval from a concerned public. Applying Bossuyt's criteria it is clear that continuing this regime of sanctions is immoral and indefensible.
That is the point that Sir Ivor Roberts, and British Government policy, miss entirely. - Yours, etc.,
Justin Kilcullen, Director, Tr≤caire, Booterstown Avenue, Blackrock, Co Dublin.