Built around a
clearer claim experience.

As a subsidiary organ of the Security Council, the Commission operated within the framework of the Council’s resolutions, particularly resolutions 687 (1991), 692 (1991), 986 (1995) and 1483 (2003) that together established the Commission, its jurisdiction, its policy guidelines and its financing.

As those resolutions made clear, the Commission was established to process claims and pay compensation for losses and damage suffered by individuals, corporations, Governments and international organizations as a direct result of Iraq’s unlawful invasion and occupation of Kuwait. The legal responsibility and liability of Iraq for those losses and damage was established by the Security Council and expressly accepted by the Government of Iraq. The Commission was thus neither a court nor a tribunal with an elaborate adversarial process. Rather, the Commission was created as a claims resolution facility that could make determinations on a large number of claims in a reasonable time. As such, the Commission operated more in an administrative manner than in a litigation format. The Commission’s claims processing procedures were prescribed by the Security Council, further elaborated in Governing Council decisions and implemented by the Panels of Commissioners.