A split between the five permanent members of the UN Security Council over what to do with Iraq has frustrated efforts here to develop a new policy on UN-Iraq relations.

The Security Council is due to debate Iraq next week but the tension in the 15-nation body after the United States and Britain attacked Iraq last December continued as ambassadors tussled over Iraqi sanctions and UN monitoring of Baghdad’s weapons.

The prevailing chill became apparent this week when Brazilian Ambassador Celso Amorim – who chaired three panels to review Iraqi disarmament, sanctions and the fate of Kuwaitis missing since Iraq’s 1990 invasion – presented reports on the panels’ work to the Security Council.

Richard Butler, the Australian chairman of the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM) that monitors Iraq’s weapons, was kept from attending Amorim’s briefing – even though the disarmament report chiefly concerned his team’s work.

UN officials later said that he had not been blocked, but was simply “not invited” to the meeting.

In either case, most diplomats saw Butler’s absence as a sign of Russia’s continuing anger that the UNSCOM leader’s criticism of Iraqi cooperation with weapons inspections last December paved the way for four days of US-British air strikes, and a lingering air war since then.

Reports that US intelligence agents used UNSCOM as cover for their own espionage furthered damaged the credibility of both Butler – who declared he would leave when his term expired later this year – and UNSCOM itself.

Meanwhile, Russia and France, two of the veto-wielding permanent Council members, both used Amorim’s presentation to renew calls to lift the more than eight-year-old sanctions on Iraq, diplomats who attended the debate said.

By contrast, the United States and Britain – which also hold permanent seats – continued to oppose any change in the sanctions. (China, the fifth permanent member, wanted the embargo lifted.)

“The Council has been quiet on Iraq for several months because there is no agreement on anything,” said one Asian diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “But I think that there is more support than ever for some change in the sanctions, and I think you will see the pressure build (through April).”

The humanitarian report, prepared by a four-person panel of UN officials, offers some support for critics of the long-running sanctions regime, detailing what the UN Development Programme (UNDP) calls the “shift from relative affluence to massive poverty” in Iraq since 1990.

“The infant mortality rates in Iraq today are among the highest in the world, low infant birth weight affects at least 23 percent of all births, chronic malnutrition affects every fourth child under five years of age, only 41 percent of the population have regular access to clean water, (and) 83 percent of all schools need substantial repairs,” the report said.

The report added that the litany of problems would persist despite the “oil-for-food” exemption which allowed Baghdad to sell its oil to buy humanitarian goods under UN supervision.

“Given the present stage of the (oil) infrastructure, the revenue required for its rehabilitation is far above the funding level available under the (oil-for-food) programme,” the report said.

“The precarious state of the oil industry infrastructure, if allowed to deteriorate further, will have disastrous effects on the country’s ability to cover the costs for basic humanitarian needs.”

Any lifting of sanctions seemed distant, while the US and British governments continued to support the embargo and the return of UNSCOM – which has not been welcome in Iraq since the December air strikes.

The disarmament report, prepared by a 20-member panel including several UNSCOM officials, argued that Iraq still had to account for several prohibited weapons programmes – including its production of biological weapons and of ‘VX’ nerve agent.

But it added that “the bulk of Iraq’s proscribed weapons programmes has been eliminated”.

Accordingly, the panel recommended that UNSCOM shifted from more its intrusive activity – such as surprise inspections of Iraqi military sites – to “ongoing monitoring and verification”, to prevent any rebuilding of banned weapons capability.

Iraq sought such a change for years but, since December, it has resisted all weapons inspections while demanding that sanctions be lifted immediately before any disarmament work proceeds.

The report by the third panel, on Kuwaiti prisoners-of-war and compensation for the damage caused by Iraq’s short-lived 1990 invasion of its Gulf state neighbour, was not expected to cause any major dispute in the Council.

It said that Iraq must account for the status of 605 missing people but adds that the Council should not “trigger a political discussion or…affect the humanitarian treatment of the issue.”