IRAQ The United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) was mandated by UN Security Council Resolution 1500 on 14 August 2003 and formally commenced its operations on 1 September 2003. July 2003 United Nations envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello, fresh from a two-day workshop in Baghdad on how to ensure justice for past human rights violations by the ousted regime of Saddam Hussein, said the world body would facilitate nationwide dis- cussions throughout Iraq to identify further necessary action. The United Nations Security Council discussed Secretary-General Kofi Annan's recommendation to phase out by 6 October the UN peacekeeping operation that for nearly 12 years had monitored the demilitarised zone between Iraq and Kuwait. Sergio Vieira de Mello met with British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw in Baghdad to discuss the situation in Iraq, the UN role and the best way to give Iraqis the chance to establish their own democratic institutions as soon as possible. The President of the United Nations Security Council for July said that while tackling volatile developments in Africa would be a major focus throughout the month, the 15-nation body was also set to hold the first review of the implementa- tion of its resolution on arrangements for post-war Iraq. With the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr becoming a key entry point for humanitarian supplies, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said it had already brought more than one million tons of food into the country since April, enough to feed the entire population for two months. The Security Council voted unanimously to phase out by 6 October the UN peacekeeping operation. Every hour, the WFP was delivering 1,000 tons of food to Iraq in what the agency billed as the largest such operation in its 40-year history. Iraqi asylum-seekers should not be forced to return to their country for at least another month because the situation there was too volatile, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) warned. Sergio Vieira de Mello condemned a rocket propelled grenade attack on a com- pound used by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Mosul, north- ern Iraq. A UN refugee agency team went to the northern Iraqi town of Kalar to look into reports that large numbers of Iranians had left Al Tash camp, west of Baghdad, and relocated to the north because of insecurity and lack of assistance. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) stepped up their battle against the illicit traffic in Iraqi cultural properties after widespread looting there with the establishment of a regularly updated database. Sergio Vieira de Mello discussed the evolving political process in Iraq with the head of the United States-run provisional administration, L. Paul Bremer. Deteriorating security, lack of essential services and the absence of a functioning civil administration in many parts of Iraq was likely to prevent large-scale refugee returns until 2004, the top United Nations refugee official for the country said. As part of his continuing efforts to consult with a full spectrum of Iraqi soci- ety, Sergio Vieira de Mello made his fourth trip outside Baghdad, visiting the city of Hilla, where local leaders called for the UN to play a larger role in the country's affairs. Expanding his consultations on efforts to help Iraqis create a stable, demo- cratic and sovereign country, he traveled to Taif, Saudi Arabia, for talks with Crown Prince Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz and other senior Saudi officials. The Crown Prince voiced his full support for United Nations efforts to foster peace in Iraq. Sergio Vieira de Mello hailed the formation of the country's new Governing Council and pledged the United Nations' full support on the long road to recovery. Visiting more of Iraq's neighbours in his efforts to help create a stable, demo- cratic and sovereign country, Sergio Vieira de Mello arrived in Damascus for talks with Syrian President Bashir al Assad. Uranium compounds dispersed in the reported looting of nuclear and radio- active material at the Tuwaitha complex in Iraq posed no danger from the point of view of proliferation, the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency (IAEA) deter- mined. Children continued to be killed and maimed at a steady pace by the remnants of war - coalition cluster bombs looking like toys, thousands of tons of Iraqi muni- tions abandoned in residential areas and leaking missiles lying around Baghdad - the United Nations children's agency (UNICEF) said. Multi-million dollar contracts for heavy equipment and spare parts for Iraq's oil and electricity sectors were prioritised for immediate delivery after talks with United Nations agencies, the United States-run Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) and Iraqi representatives, the UN Office of the Iraq Programme (OIP) announced. The top United Nations envoy for Iraq heard more calls for broadening the world body's role there while visiting neighbouring Iran even as major govern- ments, including the United States, which ran the ruling Provisional Authority in Baghdad, were raising that possibility with United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Sergio Vieira de Mello discussed with Iraqi Kurdish leaders the return of hun- dreds of thousands of people, mostly Kurds, forcibly displaced under Saddam Hussein's devastating "Arabization" policy, calling it a priority but one that also needed a fair solution for the Arabs brought in to replace them. .