i would fight for aus.would you??????, page-72

re: here's a brave military boy like bultana Whose fault did you say it was??

Under the terms of the United Nations oil-for-food program, Baghdad is permitted to sell unlimited amounts of crude oil and use the revenues to buy humanitarian goods for the Iraqi people.

But in practice, that simple formula, which is supposed to ease the suffering of the Iraqi population under UN sanctions, rarely works smoothly.

The present situation of the oil-for-food program illustrates the point. The program is suffering from a $2.25 billion shortfall in funds, which could have been used to purchase enormous quantities of foods, medicines, and other products for ordinary Iraqis. Instead, the goods are not being purchased because Baghdad has cut its oil exports in a dispute with the UN Sanctions Committee over how the oil should be priced for sale.

The dispute has seen Iraq decrease its oil exports to a current level of just 1.2 million barrels per day, which is about half of its sustainable export capacity of 2.2 million barrels per day. At the same time, the export drop has been exacerbated by Iraq's periodically halting its oil exports altogether to make various political points. A halt for several weeks last summer protested efforts by London and Washington to tighten the sanctions regime against imports of goods with potential military uses. A stoppage this year protested Israeli military operations in the Palestinian territories.

As Iraq's oil exports and revenues have fallen, Baghdad and the UN Sanctions Committee have each faulted the other for playing with the welfare of the Iraqi population. Washington and London, the strongest backers of the sanctions regime, say Iraq has cut its exports in an effort to force the lifting of pricing controls intended to prevent Baghdad from imposing secret surcharges on oil buyers, surcharges that circumvent the oil-for-food program.

Uncle Saddam.....nice bloke ..the pacifists friend.