POGO and saddam's pre-war "Weapons Declaration"

"Mass of documents and several CDs detailing Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological activities, being shown to media before being turned over (Photo: AP)"

I mentioned the other day that i was gonna try to get POGO involved in trying to get saddam's 8000 redacted - i heard back from them - here's the email:

Thanks for your email. POGO’s definitely interested in trying to obtain these 8000 pages. Do you know who possesses the 4000 unredacted ones and if they are available? Which government agency has the pages (I’m assuming the CIA and DIA have them) and do you know the name of the document?

Any other useful info is extremely welcome.

YAY!

firstly, here's some background on the document:

The Weapons Declaration was a result of paragraph 3 of UN resolution 1441. the relevant section as follows:

"3. Decides that, in order to begin to comply with its disarmament obligations, in addition to submitting the required biannual declarations, theGovernment of Iraq shall provide to UNMOVIC, the IAEA, and the Council, notlater than 30 days from the date of this resolution, a currently accurate, full,and complete declaration of all aspects of its programmes to develop chemical,biological, and nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, and other delivery systemssuch as unmanned aerial vehicles and dispersal systems designed for use onaircraft, including any holdings and precise locations of such weapons,components, sub-components, stocks of agents, and related material andequipment, the locations and work of its research, development and productionfacilities, as well as all other chemical, biological, and nuclear programmes,including any which it claims are for purposes not related to weapon productionor material;"

here is the letter (December 7th) from iraq to the UN - with 9 pages of Table of Contents

"Sir,
I should like to transmit to you, through the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the declarations required under paragraph 3 of Security Council resolution 1441..."

Why couldnt everyone see it?

According to a report in The Guardian newspaper on December 11, the US obtained agreement from Colombia, at the time serving as president of the Security Council, to hand over the documentation for it to analyse and copy. This was an apparent breach of a Security Council agreement that the document would be first analysed by UN specialists before being made available to member states.

The US provided copies of the full documentation to the four other permanent members: Russia, China, France and Great Britain. Whether anything was first removed from this report is a matter of contention. (link)

The Bush and Blair governments were immediately on the same TalkingPoints:

"As part of resolution 1441, Iraq had to produce an accurate, full and complete declaration of its weapons programmes. But Iraq's declaration in December, almost 12,000 pages, was a clear attempt to confuse and hinder analysis." (link)

fwiw - the US State Dept replied to the Weapons Declaration 12 days later titled" "Illustrative Examples of Omissions from the Iraqi Declaration to the United Nations Security Council" which lays out the case that saddam didnt mention all the anthrax and UAV's and uranium from niger and mobile weapons labs and whatnot, and their response ends thusly:

"None of these holes and gaps in Iraq's declaration are mere accidents, editing oversights or technical mistakes: they are material omissions."

Who has the document? I'm not sure - but David Kay (CIA) at the Iraq Survery Group probably had a full copy - the ISG might be a good place to start. Larry WIlkerson seems to be doing a lot of interviews at the moment - perhaps we could ask him for his opinion on the document.

As mentioned above, Russia, China, France and Great Britain all got a purportedly full copy. the non-permanent members only saw the 3500 page version.


There has been one semi-leak (only a couple of hundred of pages):

"A reporter named Andreas Zumach with the Berlin-based newspaper Die Tageszeitung obtained the portions of Iraq's 12,000-page declaration regarding its weapons program which had been redacted and erased by the U.S. government, which took possession of the report before any members of the UN Security Council could see it. According to Zumach, the redacted portions of the report describe efforts by U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories at Lawrence Livermore, Sandia and Los Alamos to train Iraqi nuclear scientists. These same laboratories gave the Iraqis non-fissionable materials for the construction of a nuclear bomb.

The redacted portions of the Iraq report also reveal the involvement of many of America's most prominent corporations in the arming of Iraq during the Reagan era. Hewlett Packard, DuPont, Honeywell, Rockwell, Tectronics, Bechtel, International Computer Systems, Unisys, Sperry and TI Coating are among the 25 American companies named who provided material assistance in the development of Iraq's chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs." (link)

If that's the case, that might explain why they might not release the entire document- at a minimum, we should try to get all the parts of the report that specifically refer to saddam's actual declaration of his capability and 'stockpiles' and the dismantling thereof and whatnot.

As best as i can tell, the document doesnt have a name - it is apparently generally referrred to only as the "12,000 page report', or occasionally "iraq's Weapon's Declaration". The only 'identifier' was on the letter from Iraq to the UNSC which is: No. M/7/657 - but that apparently refers to the letter, and not the actual document.

btw - my language may have been imprecise - ive been talking about '8000 redacted pages' and '4000 unredacted pages' - but i havent seen the 4000 pages anywhere - so its possible that they were only shared with the UNSC, and have never actually been redacted.

Does anyone else have any details to help pogo?