UN: The UN Security Council has adopted, by 14 votes to none, a resolution lifting sanctions on Iraq and granting the United States and Britain the right to exert broad control over Iraq and its oil industry until a new government is put in place in Baghdad.
Syria, the only Arab council member, boycotted yesterday's vote, complaining that it needed more time for consultations on the resolution, which was co- sponsored by Britain and Spain.
The breakthrough ends 13 years of the toughest sanctions imposed to date on a UN member and allows the immediate release on to the world market of eight million barrels of Iraqi oil tied up in the Turkish port of Ceyhan.
The adoption of resolution 1483 at a morning session also ends an eight-month period of bitter wrangling at the Security Council over the US-led invasion of Iraq, which was opposed by a majority of council members.
The vote was a foregone conclusion after the French, Russian and German foreign ministers announced in Paris on Wednesday they would support the text despite reservations about the subordinate UN role in running post-war Iraq and forming a new government.
The final resolution left the main goal of the United States intact. As occupying powers, the US and Britain remain in control of Iraq "until an internationally recognised, representative government is established". No time limit was set for the occupation to end.
In a compromise brokered by the US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, the resolution elevated the status of the UN presence in Iraq from co-ordinator to special representative.
The current UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mr Sergio Vieira de Mello, is hotly tipped to be appointed to the job by UN special representative by the UN Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan. The Brazilian diplomat, who oversaw East Timor's transition to independence, has the backing of Mr Powell and was on his way from Geneva to New York last night, according to a UN diplomat.
The task of the UN special representative is to co-ordinate humanitarian and reconstruction assistance, to help in the development of representative government institutions and to encourage international support for Iraq's recovery.
Never before has the Security Council adopted a resolution which could be interpreted as an endorsement of an invasion that its members opposed.
"The resolution gives the international community a legal basis for its activities in Iraq," Mr Annan told reporters. "This is the product of a compromise and we have to work with it."
Revenues from Iraq's oil industry will now go to the Development Fund of Iraq, held in Iraq's Central Bank, under the control of a former US bank executive. It will be monitored by an international board with representatives from the UN, the IMF, the Arab Fund for Social and Economic Development and the World Bank.
They will be used on Iraqi reconstruction, humanitarian needs, disarmament, funding the Iraqi civilian administration and "other purposes benefiting the people of Iraq". The revenues will help pay for the major contracts for reconstruction already granted by the US government without competition to major American companies like Bechtel and Haliburton.
Oil sales will be immunised against attachment by international creditors until December 31st, 2007. Without the UN resolution, Iraqi oil could be seized on the high seas to meet debts incurred by the old regime.
Russia has $4 billion in contracts with pre-war Baghdad and a provision extending the time to wind down the oil-for-food programme to six months could allow it to complete more than $1 billion in contracts, observers said.
The programme has $13 billion in escrow and $10 billion in existing contracts which will be vetted by Mr Annan; $1 billion will be transferred immediately to the occupying powers.
A key compromise which helped to obtain near-unanimity at the UN was a provision which allows the Security Council to review the implementation of the resolution within 12 months.
The United States also left open the prospect of the readmission of UN weapons inspectors to Iraq, as demanded by several council members. The British ambassador, Sir Jeremy Greenstock, said the coalition saw a role for the UN inspectors "in confirming that Iraq is free of any threat in the area of weapons of mass destruction". He added: "I hope the vote marks a return to sustained consensus on one of the most difficult foreign policy issues we have faced."
The Syrian abstention was not unexpected. Syria's ambassador to the UN, Mr Mikhail Wehbe, flew to Damascus for consultations and had not returned to vote on a resolution which could be seen to legitimise the occupation of another Arab country.
The US ambassador, Mr John Negroponte, said that after more than a decade of being frozen out of the world economy by sanctions, "it is time for the Iraqi people to benefit from their natural resources".
The vote was a diplomatic triumph for the US and represented an acceptance of the reality that the Americans and British are in control on the ground and the Security Council would be seen as obstructive if it refused to lift sanctions now that Saddam Hussein had been deposed.
At the same time it shows that the US needs international backing for its task in rebuilding the shattered country and helping Iraq to establish a representative government. In the last two weeks, Washington made more than 90 changes in the text to meet the wishes of other council members.
One diplomat said the US and France could not compromise on the issue of war and peace before the invasion but they could come to terms on the post-war situation.
The French ambassador, Mr Jean-Marc de la Sabliere, noted the resolution "is not perfect" but "we believe it now provides a credible framework in which the international community can lend support to the Iraqi people."
The resolution bars Iraqis alleged to have committed crimes and atrocities from receiving safe haven in other countries and calls for accountability for crimes and atrocities committed by members of Saddam's regime.
It bans international trade in Iraqi cultural property and other archaeological, historical, cultural, religious and rare scientific items illegally removed from the Iraq National Museum, National Library and other locations.