DfID Iraq staff 'sat in tents'

[Hopeless Romantic]

The Iraq war enquiry has heard that Department for International Development staff in Iraq did very little in the aftermath of the war.

Admiral Lord Boyce, former Chief of the Defence Staff said that the armed forces did much of the reconstruction work and that DfID wasn't sure if Iraqis "were poor enough to deserve aid."

He told the enquiry: "You had people on the ground who were excellent operators from DfID who were told to sit in a tent and not to do anything because that was the instruction they received."

Clare Short, then International Development Secretary, was vocal at the time in her opposition to the invasion of Iraq, and said that Britain should not go to war without a second UN resolution.

She has also said in the past that claims of her hindering reconstruction were inaccurate and misleading.

However, Lord Boyce said that he thought "DfID were particularly uncooperative, as led by Clare Short."

Sir Kevin Tebbit, a former senior Ministry of Defence civil servant also said: "DfID felt a second UN resolution was absolutely essential before they could agree to do anything. That meant that it was only late in the day that we were able to get them fully engaged.

"Their focus on poverty relief rather than backing a strategic objective of the British government meant they were not sure at first the Iraqi people were quite poor enough to deserve major DfID aid."

He said that Prime Minister Tony Blair had "to finally hammer out the terms of proper support."

http://www.publicservice.co.uk/news_story.asp?id=11513

[Jeneral2885]

1. Iraq

wasnt meant to be a DFID target--and it eventually sucked away all the resources that could have gone to better use in other developing countries.