The US-led invasion of Iraq represented a turning point for the United Nations. It brought to the surface in the Security Council deep-going tensions between the US and Europe over their interests in the Middle East and internationally. Although the UN did not put the final seal of approval on the US invasion, by passing resolution 1441, it nevertheless legitimised the lie upon which the war was based: that Iraq had an arsenal of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons that posed an imminent threat to the world. After the event, the UN stepped in to endorse what was an illegal and preemptive war of aggression that had cost the lives of thousands, if not tens of thousands, of Iraqi civilians. The UN’s willingness to do so exposed its utter worthlessness in the eyes of millions of people around the world who took to the streets to protest the war.
Having sanctioned the US occupation, the UN sent its top troubleshooter to Iraq to repeat what he had done during the previous decade. But in the case of Iraq, the population had already suffered 12 years of bitter experiences of the UN acting on behalf of the US and its allies. The UN had supervised the devastating economic sanctions that are estimated to have cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians—men, women and children. Its offices in Baghdad were the operational centre for the UN weapons inspection teams and the intrigues that were used to justify one US military provocation after another against Iraq.
De Mello was able to use his political skills, honed throughout the 1990s, to cajole, badger and bully various Iraqi politicians, religious leaders and emigres into forming a Governing Council as a front for the US occupation. But the illusion remained precisely that. De Mello could do nothing to halt the tide of frustration and anger, which is giving rise to daily attacks on occupation forces...
