UNITED NATIONS, Dec 30: The UN Security Council voted 13-0 on Monday to extend the list of goods which are in principle banned for export to Iraq, to include about five dozen chemicals, drugs, electronic items and vehicles.

Russia and Syria abstained after the United States insisted on putting certain kinds of trucks on the list, which is designed to prevent Iraq acquiring goods with a military potential.

Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Sergei Lavrov, said the trucks were “necessary for ensuring normal civilian transport” in such industrial sectors as water, sanitation and oil refining.

Iraq, a major oil exporter, is barred outright from importing arms under UN sanctions imposed on it after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

It is allowed to use part of its oil revenue to buy civilian goods that have been approved by the Security Council’s sanctions committee for import under the UN’s oil-for-food programme.

Blocking the import of trucks could seriously disrupt the distribution of food and other humanitarian supplies, Lavrov said.

But he noted that the Goods Review List, adopted in May, was “not a denial list” and that the council had decided in adopting Resolution 1454 to review it thoroughly every 90 days.

Russia had therefore abstained rather than exercise its permanent council member’s power of veto, Lavrov said.

Syrian Ambassador Mikhail Wehbe, a non-permanent member, said he abstained because the council should be looking at lifting the 12-year-old sanctions rather than adding further restrictions.

He also complained that Syria had not had time to properly study the proposed additions to the list — a complex and highly technical document exceeding 300 pages.—AFP