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At noon last Friday, after a year of diplomatic trench warfare, the Security Council finally agreed on resolution 1284 on Iraqi sanctions and disarmament. It is the first significant change in U.N. policy toward Iraq, which has now suffered almost 10 years of the most crippling sanctions ever imposed on any country.

The resolution calls on Baghdad to accept a new monitoring and inspection regime, in return for the suspension of economic sanctions. The sanctions have now lasted the best part of a decade, and it has been a year since U.N. arms inspectors were chased out of Iraq. As a concession to Russian and Iraqi distaste for the previous inspection commission, UNSCOM, and its head, Australian diplomat Richard Butler, the new body will be known as UNMOVIC, the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection commission.

Now comes the really hard part -- persuading Saddam Hussein that this is his best chance to end the sanctions that have quietly killed more of his people than an outright military assault would have done. It does not look good so far. To begin with, Russia, China, France and Malaysia abstained on the resolution, which passed by an 11-0 vote. That makes it legal, but sends a tacit message to Iraq that there is not universal enthusiasm for the measure. which could have weakened U.N. efforts to pressure Saddam Hussein.

So far, Baghdad has repudiated the resolution. The resolution lifts the ceiling on oil sales as an inducement to Baghdad to cooperate. With its time-honored skill in making its citizenry pay the cost of its principles, Iraq is refusing to exceed the previous ceiling.

On the other hand, Saddam Hussein's regime has turned on a dime before. If he does eat his words over the resolution, he will be in good company. Resolution 1284 does actually represent a significant but under-advertised climb-down by Washington. In the past U.S. policy, as stated for example by Madeleine Albright, was to maintain sanctions until Saddam Hussein was toppled even if Iraqi civilians suffered.

In the talks on the new resolution, the United States has accepted that the purely economic sanctions will be suspended if Baghdad cooperates with the new U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission.

In past debates British and American diplomats have reiterated the terms of the original Gulf War cease-fire resolution about returning missing Kuwaiti prisoners and property, citing Iraqi non-compliance as a reason why sanctions could be maintained even if Iraq were to get a clean bill of health for destroying its weapons stockpiles.

In this resolution, the sanctions would be suspended if Iraq simply cooperates with the inspectors. The prisoners and property issue would only apply to a final formal lifting.

The new UNMOVIC would not be permitted to conduct an open-ended sifting of the sand dunes for signs of surreptitious weapon shops. It has to provide a specific work program and questions for the Iraqis to follow and answer to. For some reason, the State Department had not drawn too much attention to this aspect, and it is only since the passing of the resolution that some arms control specialists are getting upset.

It is a big concession from the United States to the rest of the world which has consistently argued that Iraq had to have "light at the end of the tunnel" as an incentive to cooperate with inspectors. It also represents a tacit admission that the air strikes the United States and the British have been mounting against Iraq for the last year have failed to dent the Baghdad regime's determination in the slightest.

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