Briefing the U.N. Security Council yesterday, chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix outlined the status and results of weapons inspections in Iraq as well as flaws that inspectors have found in Iraq’s declaration of its WMD programs (see GSN, Dec. 19).

So far, inspectors have visited 44 previously declared Iraqi sites, including three in the northern city of Mosul, Blix told the Security Council, according to the New York Times (see GSN, Dec. 20).  Inspectors have also visited eight newly declared sites and identified the location of several artillery shells and mustard gas containers, he said.  The shells and canisters, which were placed under inspectors’ supervision in 1998, will be sampled and eventually destroyed, Blix added.

The U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission has also asked Iraq to provide by the end of the year the names of personnel currently or formerly associated with its WMD programs, Blix said.  The list could be created in a top-down fashion, starting with program leaders and proceeding down to management, scientists and so on, but excluding the level of basic workers, he added.

Inspectors have the authority to interview WMD program personnel members outside of Iraq, Blix said.  While Iraq would be required to cooperate with such interviews, the practical arrangements still need to be examined, he said.

“Clearly, we could not take anybody out of Iraq without his or her consent,” Blix told the council (New York Times, Dec. 19).

In an interview yesterday with PBS’s NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, however, Blix described the complexities of removing Iraqi personnel for interviews.

“It’s said that they should be with their families.  Well, in Iraq that may mean a much larger group of people than from here,” Blix said, “and if they don’t get all the people coming out from the immediate family, they may have distant relations who may be in jeopardy if they go.”

Another concern is that once Iraq knows which scientists are to be interviewed, the projects they worked on would be quickly destroyed, Blix said (Ray Suarez, PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Dec. 19).

Declaration

During the Security Council briefing yesterday, Blix also presented an analysis of the Iraqi declaration.  Inspectors currently do not have the information needed to either confirm or deny claims in the declaration that Iraq no longer possesses weapons of mass destruction, Blix said.

The declaration itself appears to contain little new information on Iraq’s WMD efforts, Blix said.  It does contain, however, new material related to Iraq’s nonweapons activities conducted since 1998, when inspectors withdrew prior to a U.S.-British air campaign, he said.

In the chemical, biological and missile sections of the declaration, Iraq appears to have submitted information that is essentially the same as information in previous reports, Blix said.  For example, information in the biological section is “essentially a reorganized version” of a 1997 report, he said.  The information in the chemical and missiles sections is largely based on 1996 information and updates, Blix added.

Blix did inform the council that some of the information in the declaration is new.  For example, Iraq further explained its account of the amount of chemical weapons precursors it possesses, he said.  While the additional information does not answer all of the inspectors’ questions on the issue, it could help determine the ultimate use of the precursors, Blix said.

Iraq also has declared several new missile projects in various stages of development, Blix said.  These include a design for a new liquid oxygen/ethanol missile fuel plant and guidance system replacements for several surface-to-air missiles, he said.

The missile projects also include information on a short-range rocket produced with 81-milimeter aluminum tubes, Blix said.  While this project is not new, the information provided in the declaration could answer questions related to Iraq’s attempts to import such tubes, he said, adding that inspectors plan to conduct further investigations into the matter (see GSN, Oct. 7).

Besides being based largely on old information, the declaration contains several inconsistencies that Iraq will need to answer, Blix told the Security Council.  For example, while officials submitted in 1999 a table concerning the import of bacterial growth media, this table was not included in the current declaration for unexplained reasons, he said.

Iraq has also declared that it has repaired and installed civilian chemical equipment that had been destroyed under inspectors’ supervision, Blix said.  The equipment is currently at a chemical plant that inspectors have visited, but consideration now must be given to the fate of this equipment and similar equipment that had been thought destroyed, he said.

In the missile area, Iraq appears to be working on a missile with a range exceeding that allowed by U.N. regulations, according to Blix.  Iraq has declared the development of the al-Samoud missile, as well as a variant with a larger diameter, he said.  Because of the potential of this missile, inspectors told Iraq that it should not proceed with development until the missile’s capabilities have been examined.  In its latest semi-annual monitoring declaration, Iraq said the al-Samoud has exceeded the permitted range in 13 flight tests, Blix said.

Iraq also has failed to provide enough documentation, physical evidence or other supporting information to address remaining unanswered questions from previous reports, Blix said.  “Such supporting evidence ... is required to give confidence that Iraq’s declaration is indeed accurate, full and complete,” he said.

Unanswered questions include the destruction of Iraqi-produced “training” missile engines; an accounting of 50 conventional warheads that had been declared destroyed but never recovered and 550 mustard gas shells; and declarations on the production of VX nerve agent, destruction of biological agent stockpiles and remaining amounts of bacterial growth media, according to Blix.

While many questions remain unanswered, in a few cases inspectors have information that contradicts Iraq’s claims, Blix said.  For example, there are indications that Iraq’s account of its production and destruction of anthrax from 1998 to 1991 may not be accurate, he said (New York Times, Dec. 19).

During yesterday’s Security Council briefing, Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, outlined his agency’s inspections efforts and its analysis of Iraq’s nuclear declaration.

So far, IAEA inspectors have visited 68 sites, including a presidential site and six sites that were not previously declared, ElBaradei said.  Inspectors have not found any indication of prohibited activity, but the results of environmental sampling are still pending, he said.  ElBaradei also said that Iraq’s nuclear declaration contains “no substantive differences” from a 1998 report (U.S. State Department release, Dec. 19).

U.S. Response

Meanwhile, following the Security Council briefing yesterday, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell attacked the Iraqi declaration.

“The Iraqi declaration may use the language of Resolution 1441, but it totally fails to meet the resolution’s requirements,” Powell said yesterday during a State Department press conference.

The United States agrees with the inspectors’ assessment that the declaration contains little new information, Powell said, noting that some of the declaration consisted of reprints of earlier U.N. inspectors’ reports.  “The only changes the Iraqi regime made were to remove references critical to its own conduct,” he added.

Powell also outlined several issues that the United States considers unresolved in the declaration.  The declaration fails to address the fate of thousands of liters of anthrax and botulinum toxin, Powell said.  It also says nothing about certain chemical weapons precursors, suspected mobile biological weapons laboratories or the import of aluminum tubing that could have been used to develop a uranium enrichment program, he said (New York Times, Dec. 20).

The United States has also called on Iraq to answer questions related to missile fuels for classes of missiles that Iraq denies possessing; attempts to obtain uranium from Niger; 30,000 artillery shells that might be filled with chemical weapons; and discrepancies in connections between Iraq’s unmanned aerial vehicle program and biological weapons use, according to a State press release (U.S. State Department release II, Dec. 19).

“The United States, the United Nations and the world waited for this declaration from Iraq, but Iraq’s response is a catalog of recycled information and flagrant omissions,” Powell said.  “It should be obvious that the pattern of systematic holes and gaps in Iraq’s declaration is not the result of accidents or editing oversights or technical mistakes.  These are material omissions that, in our view, constitute another material breach,” he added.

“[Iraqi President] Saddam Hussein has so far responded to this final opportunity with a new lie,” Powell said.

The United States will continue to analyze the declaration and consult with allies and the Security Council on how to compel Iraq to comply with disarmament obligations, Powell said.  Inspectors also need to give a high priority to interviewing Iraqi WMD personnel and intensifying inspections, he said.

There is no set deadline for Iraq to comply with its international obligations, but time is running out, Powell said.

“There is no calendar deadline, but obviously there is a practical limit to how much longer you can just go down the road of noncooperation and how much time the inspectors can be given to do their work,” Powell said.  “This situation cannot continue,” he added (New York Times, Dec. 20).

Intelligence

Blix yesterday called on the United States and the United Kingdom to provide inspectors with intelligence information.

“We get some but we don’t get all the support we need,” Blix told BBC Radio 4.  “The most important thing that governments like the U.K. or the U.S. could give us would be to tell us sites where they are convinced that they keep some weapons of mass destruction.  This is what we want to have,” he added (Financial Times, Dec. 20).

In the NewsHour interview, Blix suggested that such intelligence information might be more useful than interviews of Iraqi scientists.

“The best thing that we could get would be if any member state would tell us, we have evidence that they keep weapons of mass destruction somewhere, rather than the round-about way to get knowledge about it from some defector,” Blix said (Suarez, PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer).

The United States has provided UNMOVIC and the IAEA with assessments of the declaration and believes additional support could increase the effectiveness of inspections, Powell said.  “We are prepared to start doing that and will be in contact with them,” he added (New York Times, Dec. 20).

Inspections

Today UNMOVIC chemical experts visited the Tuwaitha Industrial Chemical Research Center, according to an IAEA press release.  Two IAEA teams requested access to a facility at the Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Center during nonstandard hours and observed work-shift levels during the nonwork period.  The teams also inspected the Shakyli stores, which house dual-use items from Iraq’s former nuclear program, and surveyed the area for environmental gamma rays (International Atomic Energy Agency release, Dec. 20).

Yesterday an UMOVIC biological team visited three facilities at the previously declared bin al-Baetar Center at al-Taji — the Veterinary Drug Research Production Center, the Chemical Production and Analysis facility, and the Biological Research and Development Department.

IAEA experts have conducted several inspections in the area near the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, according to an agency release.  One sub-team visited underground facilities to inspect their function and recent activities.  Additional experts visited former nuclear facilities at al-Jesira.  While there, they verified sites associated with the movement of materials and equipment from the facilities, the IAEA release said.

The two IAEA subteams conducted a joint inspection of the Jaber bin Hayam site, which produces chemical protection equipment, and the al-Kindi State Company in Mosul, connected with Iraq’s missile development efforts, according to the agency release.

An additional IAEA team visited the Nahrawan conventional metals matching plant and the Mamoun factory of the Rasheed State Company, a missile fuel production site.  While at the two facilities, located in Baghdad, inspectors monitored previously known dual-use equipment and inspected new equipment, the IAEA release said (International Atomic Energy Agency release, Dec. 19).

U.N inspectors have visited every site of U.S. and British concern and have not found any banned weapons, senior Iraqi officials said yesterday.  Iraqi presidential adviser Amir al-Saadi said that Iraq has nothing to fear from the inspections process.

“We’re not worried,” al-Saadi said.  “It’s the other party that’s worried, because there’s nothing to pin on us,” he added (Nadia Abou El-Magd, Associated Press/Boston Globe, Dec. 20).

For further information, see:

UNMOVIC

IAEA Iraq Action Team

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