While incidents arising from the military missions carried out in the no-fly zones of northern and southern Iraq are reported in the media, detailed statistics are not normally provided. According to the coalition of countries which monitor these zones, the cease-fire agreement which ended the 1991 war empowers them to impose such controls over Iraqi military flights.
The effects of the UN sanctions are felt most acutely by the most vulnerable. Various figures are given for infant mortality due to the malnutrition of mothers and shortages of paediatric pharmaceuticals. The overall infant mortality rate calculated by the Population Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, the latest detailed figures are for 1995, was 129 per thousand births. This is not only a tragically high rate by international standards, but represents an increase of more than 100 per cent over the 1990 figure of 64 per thousand births.
The use of chemical weapons by the current Iraqi regime against its own citizens has been fully investigated and established to the satisfaction of the international community. The UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iraq and other observers have shown in several reports evidence of such use.
In the framework of its continuing work for full implementation of all UN Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq, the Security Council earlier this year established three panels – on disarmament, humanitarian assistance and prisoners of war – to study how to achieve this goal. These panels reported to the Security Council on 7 April.
The disarmament panel recommended the installation of a reinforced system of ongoing monitoring and verification.
The humanitarian panel recommended the stimulation of the local Iraqi economy by raising the oil production ceiling and asking non-Iraqi companies to make the necessary investment in oil industry spare parts, which could add $300 million every six months to the humanitarian programme for Iraq.
The panel on Kuwaiti prisoners of war urged Iraq to resume attendance at the meetings of the tripartite commission set up to address this issue, and of its technical sub-committee.
