March 29, 2003	Saturday	Muharram 25, 1424

LONDON, March 28: British Prime Minister Tony Blair returned on Friday from a trip to the United States having failed to convince US President George W. Bush the United Nations should have a lead role in running post-war Iraq.

“Blair has achieved far less than anticipated,” Julie Smith, European analyst for the London-based think tank Chatham House, told AFP.

“I don’t think he’s going to convince the Americans that a serious UN involvement (in Iraq) is the way to go ahead,” she said.

Mr Smith said Blair had lost important clout with the Bush administration when he failed to win a UN resolution endorsing the war against Iraq President Saddam Hussein’s regime, accused of harbouring weapons of mass destruction.

It “has become clear to the US administration that Blair does not have leverage in Europe, certainly not with France or Germany and that his own position at home is somewhat ambiguous when his own party is divided about going to war without a UN mandate,” Smith said.

On his return to London from his summit with Mr Bush, Blair said Friday he favoured the formation by the United Nations of a representative government in post-war Iraq.

“That is why we agreed — myself and President Bush, (Spanish) Prime Minister Aznar at the summit that we had in the Azores — that not just the humanitarian element but also the civil administration in Iraq should be governed by UN resolution,” Blair said.

Mr Blair chaired a cabinet meeting in London on his return but his spokesmen did not say what was discussed.

The Bush administration, apparently mistrustful of a politically divided and bureaucratically slow United Nations, wants Iraq ruled under the direct control of the US military, even if it sees a role for the United Nations in distributing humanitarian aid.

The UN Security Council on Friday is expected to vote on a resolution reactivating the UN oil-for-food programme in Iraq at the urging of the United States and Britain.

Oil-for-food, set up in December 1996 to offset the impact of UN sanctions on the Iraqi people, provides millions of dollars for feeding some 16 percent of the Iraqi population.

The United States is not ready to give the United Nations much more of a role.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Wednesday that Washington would not agree to the United Nations overseeing a transitional authority for Iraq, to be led at first by a US military commander.

“We didn’t take on this huge burden (the war) with our coalition partners not to be able to have significant, dominating control over how it unfolds in the future,” Powell said.

Blair’s position aligns him with France, something that should not endear him to the Americans.

French Foreign Mininister Dominique de Villepin said in London Thursday that the United Nations must oversee the reconstruction of Iraq.

“The legitimacy of our action depends on it,” he told the prestigious International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS).

“Is it possible to have one country taking all alone the responsibility? Personnally, in my view, it is very difficult to imagine such a possibility,” de Villepin said.

The Financial Times newspaper urged Blair to stand fast on the need for UN authorization of postwar arrangements.

“He must insist that this is non-negotiable. And this time, be prepared to break ranks sooner than back down,” the Financial Times said. —AFP