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Expulsion Serves as Lesson to UN Staff: Iraqi Official
Iraq said on Thursday that its expulsion of five international employees working for the United Nations oil-for-food program served as a lesson to UN staff working in the sanctions-hit country.
"The expulsion should serve as a lesson for the U.N. staff, the U.N., as well as the foreign countries which have sent employees to serve their interests and harm Iraq's security," Iraq's permanent representative to the United Nations Mohammad al-Duri said in a statement carried by the official Iraqi News Agency (INA).
Duri said that Iraq exercised its sovereignty by expulsing four Nigerians and one Bosnian engaged in activities harming Iraq's national security.
The marching order was in accordance with the international norms and the Vienna Convention, he said.
"Relations between the thousands of U.N. staff working in Iraq and the Iraqi government are good as long as they work within the framework of their mission," Duri said.
However, the relations will be dangerously affected if these U. N. employees try to threaten Iraq's national security, Duri added.
An Iraqi Foreign Ministry official said on Wednesday that the five people had been declared "persona non grata" and were demanded to leave Iraq within 72 hours, and they were forbidden from visiting Iraq again in the future.
Three of them had left Baghdad on Tuesday and the two others had left before Iraq's expulsion.
Iraq drove away three other U.N. employees earlier this month on similar charges, Duri added.
Iraq has been under sweeping U.N. economic sanctions since its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. It has repeatedly blasted the sanctions regime and the U.N. oil-for-food program, which it says has failed to meet Iraq's humanitarian needs.
The U.N. humanitarian deal, which was launched in 1996 as an exception to the trade embargo, allows Iraq to sell oil in return for U.N.-monitored imports of food, medicine and other basic needs to ease the sufferings of the Iraqi people.
In January, Iraq accused a U.N. official from Kenya of trying to smuggle "illegal items" into Iraq and demanded his withdrawal.
The Iraqi Foreign Ministry said at that time that "many such incidents have proven that U.N. employees are misusing their status to do things that they know very well violate Iraqi laws."
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