Strategic Assessment

During March, May, and July 2002, the UN Secretary General and the Chairman of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) engaged Iraqi representatives in talks about the terms and conditions under which verification and monitoring of Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) activities might be renewed. Efforts to verify these activities, conducted through most of the 1990s by UMMOVIC’s predecessor, UNSCOM, were discontinued in December 1998. This article explores the advance and ongoing requirements for an effective, successful monitoring and verification regimen in Iraq.