Edith M. Lederer
Associated Press
July 16, 2003

UNITED NATIONS — Iraq’s new governing council is sending a delegation to the Security Council on July 22, when the top U.N. envoy is to report on the world body’s role in postwar Iraq, U.N. officials and council diplomats said.

The delegation will include Ahmad Chalabi, founder of the once-exiled Iraqi National Congress, former foreign minister Adnan Pachachi and Foreign Ministry official Aqila al-Hashimi, who led Iraq’s delegation to a U.N.-sponsored conference here last month on rebuilding the country, U.N. deputy spokeswoman Hua Jiang said.

Spain’s U.N. Ambassador Inocencio Arias, the current Security Council president, said he had heard reports that the delegation’s visit would coincide with the July 22 briefing by U.N. Special Representative Sergio Vieira de Mello. Other council diplomats confirmed the date.

On its first full day of business on Monday, the 25-member Iraqi governing council voted to send a delegation to United Nations to assert itself as a “legitimate Iraqi body during this transitional period.”

Hua said it was unclear at this stage “under what banner” the Iraqi delegation will come to the United Nations whether as part of the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority or as Iraqi representatives. It will be up to council members to decide whether the delegation members can speak, she said.

Members of the governing council told Vieira de Mello that they would be looking for U.N. help on a number of problems, “notably the issues of refugee return and debt relief,” Hua said.

Iraq’s U.N. seat remains in the hands of diplomats who served under Saddam Hussein’s regime. Ever since Saddam’s U.N. ambassador, Mohammed Al-Douri, left New York on April 11, Iraqi diplomats have kept a very low profile, but Iraq’s U.N. Mission remains open, with the former third-ranking diplomat, Said Shihab Ahmad, in charge.

Meanwhile, U.N. nuclear inspectors said in a report that at least 22 pounds of uranium compounds could be missing from Iraq’s main nuclear facility at Tuwaitha, which was looted by Iraqis during the U.S.-led invasion.

But the material couldn’t be used to make nuclear weapons, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei, said in the report, obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.

The report said the vast majority of uranium feared stolen had been recovered, though it gave no figure. The Tuwaitha facility was thought to contain hundreds of tons of natural uranium and nearly two tons of low-enriched uranium, which could be further processed for arms use.

The missing 22 pounds could have been dispersed as dust when looters emptied approximately 200 containers at the facility, which has not been operational for more than a decade.