KUWAIT, 21 October — In a fresh drive to improve its image, Iraq handed Kuwait yesterday the first batch of some two tons of official documents it seized when it invaded Kuwait 12 years ago.
"We have taken official delivery of 30 boxes on Sunday and the work will continue on Monday," a Kuwait official said by telephone. He was speaking from a sealed demilitarized border zone at the end of the first day of a process started under a United Nations-brokered deal.
Iraq, facing the prospect of US military action to pursue "regime change" in Baghdad, said this month it planned to return government papers missing from Kuwait since its 1990 invasion of the country. The documents, comprising Kuwait’s national archive, were handed to the UN, which entered their details into a computer before giving them to Kuwait for inspection and eventual acceptance, a diplomat said.
The return of the documents has been among major stumbling blocks for Iraq in its efforts to gain the lifting of sanctions imposed on it by the United Nations since the invasion.
Iraq has said the documents include papers from Kuwait’s Foreign Ministry, National Security Department, Ministry of the Interior and mail from the office of Kuwait’s ruler, Emir Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah.
The first batch of documents handed over yesterday belonged to the Interior Ministry, officials said.
"This process is only for the archive, not the stolen property and the museum pieces," an official said of Kuwaiti belongings which were taken to Iraq, including heavy equipment from plants, weapons and other materials.
When Iraq seized Kuwait it declared the country its 19th province. The Kuwaiti archive was then taken to Iraq, and in some cases mixed up with Iraq’s own national archive.
