The United Kingdom has proposed compromise language for the latest draft resolution on Iraq that would give Baghdad more time to comply with inspections, diplomats said yesterday (see GSN, March 4).

The main thrust of the British proposal is to provide about a week for Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to comply once the resolution is adopted, diplomats said.  The compromise language would permit a “last turn around for Iraq” and require Hussein to admit his country still possessed weapons of mass destruction, according to a diplomat.  The British proposal would create a “space” between the adoption of the resolution and any military action against Iraq, according to Reuters.

It is still unknown whether the British proposal would be incorporated into the current U.S.-British draft resolution or be issued separately, diplomats said.  They noted that the United States opposes any change to the current draft resolution (Reuters/MSNBC.com, March 6).

A U.S. official said yesterday, however, that British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell might “noodle around” with some of the language in the draft resolution.  The United States is not averse to having a deadline for Iraqi compliance included in the text, the U.S. official said.

“We’re not there yet,” a second U.S. official said.  “But there are always ideas,” the official added (CNN.com, March 6).

The main purpose of the British proposal is to help increase support for a new resolution on Iraq among the still-undecided nonpermanent members of the U.N. Security Council, according to the London Times.

“The theory that the U.S. has the nine votes, the Brits are not buying,” a Security Council diplomat said.  “They are looking for a way out,” the diplomat added (London Times, March 6).

British Prime Minister Tony Blair told the House of Commons yesterday that he was confident that such support could be obtained.  Blair’s confidence is based, in part, on reports from the undecided council members that they could be persuaded to support a resolution that allowed more time and set clear disarmament tests for Hussein, the London Guardian reported (London Guardian, March 6).

France, Russia Harden Opposition

Meanwhile, France and Russia reiterated yesterday their willingness to use their authority as permanent Security Council members to block any resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq.

After a meeting yesterday in Paris, the French, German and Russian foreign ministers issued a joint statement saying they would not “let a proposed resolution pass that would authorize the use of force.”

The joint statement called for inspections to be accelerated and for inspectors to create a detailed plan to allow the Security Council to evaluate the pace and scale of Iraqi disarmament. 

Russia is making a principled stand through its opposition to war on Iraq, said Vladimir Lukin, deputy speaker of the lower house of the Russian Parliament.

“There is a principle here, a basic principle, that if someone tries to wage war on their own account, without other states, without an international mandate, it means all the world is confusion and a wild jungle,” Lukin said (John Tagliabue, New York Times, March 6).

Explicit Veto Threat

France’s threat to use its veto against a draft Iraq resolution is more than just a show, according to the Baltimore Sun.  In a meeting yesterday in The Hague with Dutch Foreign Minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, French Ambassador to the Netherlands Anne Gazeau-Secret said explicitly that her country would use its veto, de Hoop Scheffer said.

“I consider it a moment I will always remember,” said de Hoop Scheffer.  “The message was that, ‘Yes, France would use its veto.’  She used the word ‘veto.’  I still try not to imagine that it could really happen.  It would be historical.  It would do great damage to the trans-Atlantic relationship and, I think, will be a real marker in history,” he added.

Gazeau-Secret, along with German Ambassador to the Netherlands Edmund Duckwitz, did not ask de Hoop Scheffer during their meeting if the Netherlands would support their position, de Hoop Scheffer said.  Instead, the French and German diplomats only appeared to want to make clear they “they were not bluffing,” he said.

“I said, ‘You apparently have given up on a common European position,’” de Hoop Scheffer said.  “I asked, ‘Do you really think that by threatening with a veto you’ll reach your objective of getting the American administration to wait months before a vote on another resolution?’  They simply stated their position again,” he added (Todd Richissin, Baltimore Sun, March 6).

Blix Interview

Meeting with U.N. journalists yesterday, chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix said Iraq has improved its cooperation since he drafted the report he will offer tomorrow to the U.N. Security Council (see GSN, Feb. 28).

In that report he writes, “Results in terms of disarmament have been very limited so far.”  Blix told journalists yesterday, “Maybe I would not have written that sentence in light of what they have done subsequently,” a reference to the destruction of al-Samoud 2 missiles, the release of new documents, interviews with scientists and the digging up of R-400 shells, buried in 1991, that could contain biological weapons.

Blix may also present a preliminary report tomorrow on the “key remaining disarmament tasks,” as required by Security Council Resolution 1284.  U.N. inspection officials have been working on an internal document creating 29 “clusters” of outstanding questions concerning Iraq’s various weapons programs, Blix said.  “This would indicate what we plan to do and what we would expect the Iraqis to do rather precisely,” he said.  He plans, according to the timeline in Resolution 1284, to submit his final report on the remaining tasks by March 27, weeks after the controversy over the U.S.-British-Spanish draft resolution is likely to come to a head.

Blix said disarmament was proceeding in varying degrees.  The destruction of the al-Samoud 2 missiles, which began on Saturday, is “real disarmament,” with “weapons that can be used in war” being “destroyed in fairly large quantities.”  He also welcomed an Iraqi initiative of digging up the R-400 gravity bombs to prove they are not hiding the weapons.

Blix said UNMOVIC has carried out seven “interviews completely on our terms,” meaning without minders or tape recorders.  “We are not naive,” he added, referring to the impossibility of knowing whether rooms have been bugged or scientists have carried hidden tape recorders.  Nevertheless, he said, inspectors have been getting “interesting results,” such as the names of people involved in the alleged destruction of chemical and biological weapons in 1991.

The claim by Iraq that it poured into the ground prohibited weapons after the Gulf War has become a focus of UNMOVIC’s work.  Iraq admitted to having quantities of agents including anthrax and VX nerve gas, but claims it destroyed the weapons without international supervision.

“The big problem is that they claim they destroyed everything unilaterally in 1991,” said Blix.  “It has been difficult to establish and get evidence of that contention.”

Blix said the destruction Iraq claims would be “actual disarmament, if it took place.”  Iraqi officials say it is possible to test the soil in the area to verify their claims.  While welcoming these efforts, Blix said U.N. “experts are somewhat skeptical” about proving the destruction took place and about measuring the quantities that might have been destroyed.

Blix said UNMOVIC and Iraqi authorities are working on ideas including closer examinations of facilities that could produce both civilian and military items and road checks around the country to seek mobile biological weapons laboratories the United States says exist.

Blix said Iraq’s cooperation is “clearly motivated by the threats around them. ...  I hope it is not too late” (Jim Wurst, Global Security Newswire).

Powell Criticizes Iraqi Compliance

In a speech yesterday, Powell released new U.S. intelligence information that he said contradicted claims made by U.N. inspectors that Iraq has increased its compliance.

For example, while inspectors were overseeing the destruction of banned al-Samoud 2 missiles, U.S. intelligence had discovered that Iraq had begun to hide machinery that could “convert other kinds of engines” to power the same rockets, Powell said.  While U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix said yesterday that Iraq had begun to allow inspectors to conduct private interviews with Iraqi scientists, Powell said Iraq had bugged the interview locations or the scientists themselves.

“The inspectors are very, very dedicated professionals,” Powell said during a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.  “These are terrific people,” he said, adding that any inadequacy of the inspections was not “any fault of theirs.”

The focus on various aspects of the inspection process, however, has distracted attention from the real issue — whether Iraq is complying fully with inspections and whether it has revealed all of its WMD efforts, Powell said.

“Has Saddam Hussein made a strategic, political decision to comply with the United Nations Security Council resolutions?”  Powell asked.  “That’s the question.  There is no other question.  Everything else is secondary or tertiary.  That’s the issue,” he said (Weisman/Barringer, New York Times, March 6).

United States Boots Iraqi Diplomats

In New York, the United States has expelled two members of the Iraqi mission to the United Nations for conducting inappropriate activities.

Nazih Abdullatif Rahman and Yehia Naeem Suaoud have been asked to leave the United States by midnight tomorrow, according to Reuters.

“The two attaches were engaged in activities outside the scope of their official functions.  Federal law enforcement authorities deemed the activities to be harmful to our national security,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement.

Iraq’s U.N. Ambassador Mohammed al-Douri defended the two men, saying they were only security guards.

“They (U.S. officials) are always talking about their activities being in contradiction of their diplomatic duties, but they are inside the mission all of the time and how do they have the time to do this?” al-Douri said (Reuters, March 6).

The United States has also asked about 60 countries to expel select Iraqi residents who could be possible agents preparing to attack U.S. interests, officials said.  The United States has identified about 300 Iraqi people, some working as diplomats in Iraqi embassies, in 60 countries that it wants expelled, U.S. officials said.  They added that the countries are expected to comply with the U.S. request (George Gedda, Associated Press/Yahoo.com, March 6).

United Nations

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan yesterday denied recent media reports that the United Nations had begun developing plans for administering a post-Hussein Iraq, saying the United Nations has “no mandate to make these plans.”

“There is no U.N. plan for managing or administering Iraq,” Annan said.  “There is some preliminary thinking but there is no plan and no document,” he said.

What the United Nations has been doing is preparing to help deal with the humanitarian situation likely to arise after an attack on Iraq, Annan said.  “We have been doing lots of good work and contingency planning for the humanitarian aspects and obviously some preliminary thinking on what would happen if there were to be war and the other aspects of post-conflict Iraq,” he said (U.N. release, March 5).

To help prepare for a possible humanitarian crisis following a war with Iraq, the Bush administration is preparing to ask the Security Council to transfer control of Iraq’s purchases of food and supplies from Baghdad to the United Nations.

White House military and civilian agencies have begun to arrange deliveries of food and medicine to Iraq under the assumption that existing networks could be disrupted during war, according to the Washington Post.  To prevent delays of such deliveries, U.S. and British officials want the United Nations to take control of the spending of Iraq’s oil revenue, the Post reported.

The proposed resolution transferring spending authority to the United Nations is being designed to include “absolutely nothing controversial,” a U.S. official said.  The resolution would cover financial arrangements, increase the number of border crossings for humanitarian shipments and modify U.N. monitoring (Peter Slevin, Washington Post, March 6).

Inspections

U.N. inspectors traveled to al-Taji today to continue supervising the destruction of al-Samoud 2 missiles, an Iraqi official said (see related GSN story, today; Reuters, March 6).

Yesterday, inspectors visited at least eight suspect Iraqi sites, according to an International Atomic Energy Agency press release. 

Chemical experts from the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission inspected two plants at al-Qa Qaa complex. 

UNMOVIC biological inspectors traveled to the Bashair Trading Company in Baghdad to assess the site’s involvement in Iraq obtaining mobile biological laboratories.  They also inspected the Samarra East Airfield.

Inspectors based in Mosul traveled to Salahaddin University in Irbil.  Inspectors also went to the Mosul Gas Electric Company.

IAEA inspectors visited two sites in central Baghdad — a state-owned trading company and the computer center of a state-owned bank.  IAEA inspectors also conducted a radiation survey in an area southeast of Baghdad (IAEA release, March 5).

For further information, see:

UNMOVIC

IAEA Iraq Action Team

U.N. Resolution 1441

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