A club for the disgruntled?

Why should the UN's role be confined to humanitarian?

Who should adopt what role in post war Iraq? This is the hot question in international politics. The White House has made clear what involvement America should have. But what of the United Nations, Europe and Iraq's neighbours?

Mark Malloch Brown is the head of the UN Development Programme. He tells Tim Sebastian what place he thinks the UN has in the rebuilding of Iraq.

Click here to watch the full interview

Government officials attending the EU summit agreed that the UN must have a vital role in any future reconstruction of post-conflict Iraq.

However, so far UN involvement has been strictly confined to humanitarian aid.

International legitimacy

If Washington has its way that is clearly where it will stay.

But can any interim government have international legitimacy without broad UN sanction?

And if the US side-steps the UN will the organisation become irrelevant?

Mark Malloch Brown, head of the UN Development Programme said, "There is absolutely no future for the UN if it merely a club for the disgruntled....Getting back on the same side as the US is critical."

But he insisted that the UN must have a nation-building role in Iraq and that the US ultimately would have to be pragmatic.

Getting back on the same side as the US is critical

Mark Malloch Brown

America will have to accept that the UN can provide the multi-lateral support that can lend future political reconstruction in Iraq.

Asking why the UN has not agreed to lift the sanctions as President Bush has called for, Malloch Brown said that they would be lifted soon.

He acknowledged that, " it still has got some future shelf life" and will depend on how soon Iraq has a recognised government.

Malloch Brown spoke about the need for the UN to work step by step to bring people together but said emphatically that the "UN cannot be a subcontractor to the US."

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