Iraq Sanction Will Be Eased

The 11 year-long economic sanction against Iraq is expected to eased.

The British government will circulate a draft at UN Security Council resolution in New York next week, proposing that all controls on civilian goods would end, but severe checks on anything considered to be military or weapons-related would be imposed, reported the BBC News of the Britain.

The BBC reported the plan to ease Iraq sanctions, quoting a British official ``this measure implies a radical change of policy toward Iraq.``

Richard Boucher, the US State Department spokesman, said that ``the administration was in a sort of intermediate stage of consultation with Security Council members.`` His remarks suggests that the Britain and the United States already finished the prior concession about the modification of Iraq sanction.

And Boucher emphasized that ``The goal of this process is to control effectively Iraq`s ability to threaten its neighbors, especially to control Iraq`s ability to threaten its region with weapons of mass destruction, and at the same time enable civilian goods to reach the Iraqi people.``

New York Times analyzed that ``The broad outlines of this measure have gained a support from Russia and China, Iraq`s traditional advocates on the 15-member Security Council, and it means the significant change of the US policy toward Iraq.``

The Associated Press (AP) reported, that it seems to be a suggestion of Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, who is known as a moderate, who had persuaded President Bush to ease sanctions against Iraq.

In 1996, the UN eased a partial sanctions to oil export and gave chance to buy more civilian goods through controlled oil sales.

The foreign news prospected that the new sanction plan will be determined before June 4 when the existing sanction policy `oil-for-food program` ends.

The foreign news, including the BBC news, never mentioned that new sanction program would include the permission of all-out oil sales or resumption of a direct airline. Therefore, new sanction is likely to involve only trade activities.

Paik Kyung-Hak stern100@donga.com