No Shortage of Reasons for Iraq Oil Ban : U.N. embargo finds support in latest exposure of Baghdad lies about its weaponry

Saddam Hussein clings to power using the time-proven tools of tyrants. He deploys huge, ruthless and ubiquitous secret police and intelligence services to sniff out and punish any suspected opponents. He spreads around money and favors to buy the loyalty of these enforcers, members of the military and political elite and his own fractious clan. But money has become tight. The U.N. embargo that has been in effect since Iraq invaded Kuwait five years ago has reduced Iraq’s earlier exports of 3 million barrels of oil daily to an illicit trickle. Iraq has been lobbying hard to get the Security Council to lift the embargo. Recent events provide ample reasons why the ban should remain.

Reason one is further compelling evidence that Iraq continues to lie about where it stands in disposing of its weapons of mass destruction. This and other examples of non-cooperation in meeting U.N. resolutions make it practically and morally impossible for the Security Council to conclude that Iraq has complied with the conditions set for easing the sanctions. Last week’s defection to Jordan of Lt. Gen. Hussein Kemal Majid, Saddam Hussein’s son-in-law and the man once in charge of providing the U.N. inspectors information about the weapons programs, has forced Baghdad to admit that cheating has indeed been going on, though--another lie--it blames the cheating all on Majid. Rolf Ekeus, the chief U.N. weapons inspector, is now in Iraq to get the regime’s latest version of what really has been happening. Wisely, he probably will stop in Amman next week to get Majid’s version. There should be no doubt about which he will find more credible.

Reason two for keeping the pressure of sanctions on is that increasingly desperate conditions in Iraq seem inexorably to be sapping the regime’s staying power. The economy staggers under lack of output and soaring inflation. What little oil revenues come in from clandestine sales go to maintain the lifestyles of the rich and infamous. The Iraqi people are not unaware of the inequality of hardship imposed by the sanctions.

There is a longstanding U.N. offer to let Iraq export a limited amount of oil if it agrees that the revenues would go chiefly for humanitarian relief. Now is the time for the Security Council to press that offer anew, always with the insistence that the oil money be spent under strict U.N. oversight. This approach would maintain the overall impact of the embargo on the regime, even as it helped ease the pain of those Iraqis who have already suffered most because of their leader’s crimes.