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Suggestions that the United Nations would "play a vital role" in post-war Iraq are welcomed, but any potential involvement of the world body could come only at the direction of the Security Council, a UN spokesman said Tuesday.
"We welcome any indications of an important role for the United Nations in post-conflict Iraq," spokesman Fred Eckhard said, reacting to statements by the leaders of the United Kingdom and the United States in Northern Ireland.
"I don't think we have a clearer sense of what that role might be, and we would expect the Security Council to define whatever role... that we might have in Iraq after the conflict has ended," he told a press briefing at the UN headquarters in New York.
The spokesman stressed the world body's experience in the administration of post-conflict situations as in Afghanistan, but that it depended on what the Security Council wants it to do in Iraq.
"It's not that we're looking for a particular role. We know we can coordinate humanitarian relief. If that's what the Security Council asks us to do, we're happy to do it energetically," he said.
"We feel that for the legitimacy of any new governmental authority established in Iraq, and therefore for the stability of the region as a whole, it would be in everyone's best interest if the international community were brought to play in the establishment of such a government or authority," he said.
(Xinhua News Agency April 9, 2003)
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