PM MALIKI LETTER TO PRESIDENT OF UNSC

Letter dated 13 Dec 2009 from the Prime Minister of Iraq addressed to the President of the Security Council

I refer to my letter dated 7 December 2008 addressed to the President of the Security Council, in which I made it clear that Iraq is committed to finding a satisfactory solution to the problem of the debts and claims that it inherited from the previous regime. In that letter, I expressed the wish of the Government of Iraq that the temporary assistance provided by the international community should continue, in order to permit that goal to be achieved. I also made it clear that the Government of Iraq recognizes that the Development Fund for Iraq plays an important role in ensuring that oil and gas revenues are employed in the best interests of the Iraqi people, and that the International Advisory and Monitoring Board helps to ensure that those resources are managed in a transparent and responsible fashion. In 2010, the Government of Iraq will make appropriate arrangements for the Development Fund for Iraq and International Advisory and Monitoring Board, with a view to ensuring that oil revenue continues to be used fairly and in the interests of the Iraqi people. Such arrangements will be in keeping with the Constitution and with international best practices with respect to transparency, accountability and integrity. Here, I should like to affirm that in 2009, the Government of Iraq made great progress in settling the above-mentioned debts and claims, including by concluding agreements on the reduction of sovereign debt and other bilateral agreements concerning certain claims.

During the remainder of 2009 and in 2010, we will take action to recover the international financial standing of Iraq while at the same time managing oil and gas revenues in order to benefit the people of Iraq.

Those goals cannot be achieved without the continued assistance of the international community by means of the adoption of a Security Council resolution whereby the conditions and arrangements provided for in resolution 1859 (2008) are extended. That resolution concerned the extension of the mandates of the Development Fund for Iraq and the International Advisory and Monitoring Board for a period of 12 months. A review of the new extension should be conducted before 15 June 2010 at the request of the Government of Iraq.

I should be grateful if you would circulate this letter to the members of the Security Council as soon as possible and include it as an annex to the resolution currently being drafted on the extension of the mandates referred to above.

Accept, Sir, the assurances of my highest consideration.

(Signed) Nuri Kamel al-Maliki
Prime Minister of the Republic of Iraq
13 December 2009