DUBAI -- International civilian flights into Baghdad are turning into a stampede as one Arab country after another announces, or carries out, its intention of joining France and Russia in breaking the 10-year aerial blockade. This may not breach the essence of U.N. sanctions -- the restrictions on trade and the external controls on Iraqi finances -- but Iraq is not hiding its delighted conviction that it is a key breakthrough in that direction. According to Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz, who welcomes every new arrival at Saddam International Airport, it marks "the beginning of the collapse of the embargo." Oil Minister Amer Rashid predicts that "sanctions will be eroded, disintegrated."
After last week's pioneering flights from Jordan and Yemen, aircraft from at least five other Arab states -- Syria, Libya, Egypt, Morocco and Sudan -- are expected to follow suit, sponsored either by governments or nongovernment organizations. The Iraqi view is widely shared in the Arab world. Arab governments are contending that the flights are "humanitarian" only. They also argue that U.N. resolutions do not formally prohibit commercial passenger flights: That is a "U.S. interpretation," said one member of the delegation on the Yemeni flight to Baghdad on Friday.
But despite these justifications -- mainly designed to rebut U.S. censure -- neither Arab officials nor the public make much effort to disguise the belief that, in reality, the flights seriously erode the edifice of "containment" thrown up around the Iraqi regime, and that the ultimate objective is to dismantle it altogether. Kuwait's al-Watan newspaper voiced a widely held sentiment when it said Thursday that the collapse of sanctions may now be "only a matter of time" and that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's international rehabilitation may become unstoppable unless efforts to overthrow him are stepped up.