Lurid past bared in UN mission

The United Nations inspection mission in Iraq has been fully prepared for controversy over chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Instead, the first crisis it faced yesterday was about sado-masochism, pansexuality and leather fetishes.

Senior officials were trying to explain how one of the most crucial missions it has undertaken contains an American former secret service officer who has no specialised degree in any of the sciences, but ample expertise in unusual sexual practices.

Harvey John "Jack" McGeorge was nominated by the United States government for the monitoring mission which may well decide whether or not there is a cataclysmic war in the next few months.

The revelations of his personal details have, in turn, led to the disclosure that no background checks had been made on any member of the Iraq team.

McGeorge, who also served in the US Marines, is waiting in New York to join Unmovic (UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission) in Baghdad.

He runs a business offering seminars on "weaponisation of chemical and biological agents" at $595 a session, and advertises his services as a "certified United Nations inspector".

An internet search has also disclosed that McGeorge offers training seminars of a different kind involving "various acts conducted with knives and ropes".

This relates to his role as co-founder of Black Rose, a "pansexual S&M group" based in Washington and also as a founder of Leather Leadership Conference, which "produces training sessions for current and potential leaders of the sadomasochistic/leather/fetish community".

McGeorge said that a State Department official invited him to apply for a job with the UN team, and neither State Department nor UN officials asked about his S&M background.

He was interviewed in person by Hans Blix, the chief inspector, and trained with Unmovic in February last year.

He told the Washington Post: "I have been very upfront with people in the past about what I do, and it has never prevented me from getting a job or doing a service. I am who I am. I am not ashamed of who I am - not one bit."

However, he added that he was now considering resigning his UN post.

Iraqi officials, who have always claimed that American members of the team may not be what they seem, were still digesting the fact that the first one to be exposed was not involved with the CIA or the FBI, but S&M.

A foreign ministry official said, "It is very disturbing that the Americans have put forward someone like this. Apart from a strange sexual life, he does not have the academic qualification for these complex issues.

"And he is also a former member of their secret service. How many other of these types are they getting into the UN mission?"

For the inspectors, who had been talking tough about how Saddam Hussein has no hiding place for weapons of mass destruction, this was an acute embarrassment on only their second day of checks.

An official in Baghdad said: "It is very difficult. We are hoping the man will now resign, and we can draw a veil over this."

Ewen Buchanan, an Unmovic spokesman, said: "As the UN, with people applying from many countries, we do not have the capacity to carry out background checks.

"I believe Mr McGeorge is technically very competent. He knows his subject, which is weapons."

A State Department official confirmed that McGeorge was recommended to Unmovic, and that no background checks were conducted.

Senior members of the Bush administration have been accused of undermining the UN Iraq mission, while US officials have claimed that Blix has chosen an inexperienced team, leaving out inspectors previously in Iraq who were deemed too aggressive in pursuing their task. There have also been complaints from Washington that not enough American and British personnel were chosen.

UN experts inspected an animal vaccine production lab and an active munitions factory near Baghdad yesterday, the second day of their hunt for suspected weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

The inspections proceeded fairly smoothly, just as they did the day before when the weapons inspectors resumed work in Iraq after a four-year gap.

But, taking no chances, the inspectors ordered electronic debugging equipment to make sure the Iraqi authorities were not eavesdropping on their headquarters.

Samples were taken away from the al-Dawrah vaccine plant, which was shut down by a previous UN team in 1996.

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Herald feature: Iraq