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Iraq I: United States Surveils U.N. Security Council DiplomatsThe United States has begun a surveillance campaign against U.N. Security Council diplomats in an effort to obtain information on how they might vote on a U.S.-British supported resolution on Iraq, the London Observer reported yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 28). The surveillance campaign was outlined in a memo prepared by Frank Koza, chief of staff in the Regional Targets section of the U.S. National Security Agency, according to the Observer. The memo, dated Jan. 31, directed agency staff to increase surveillance operations directed at Security Council members, with the exception of the United Kingdom, to determine their voting intentions. It also advised agency officials that information was wanted on policies, negotiating positions and alliances — the “whole gamut of information that could give U.S. policymakers an edge in obtaining results favorable to U.S. goals or to head off surprises.” There had been debate within the White House over launching the operation, which was requested by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, said sources in Washington. Some Bush administration officials warned of the serious consequences that could result if the operation was discovered, the Observer reported (London Observer, March 2). Blix’s Latest Report The latest report on Iraq’s disarmament from chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix makes a harsher evaluation of Iraq’s cooperation than has previous reports. “The results in terms of disarmament have been very limited so far,” Blix wrote in the report, which was distributed to Security Council members and journalists Friday afternoon. “Iraq could have made greater efforts to find any remaining proscribed items or provide credible evidence showing the absence of such items,” Blix wrote. “It is hard to understand why a number of the measures, which are now being taken, could not have been initiated earlier. If they had been taken earlier, they might have borne fruit by now.” While this part of the report bolsters the U.S. position that Iraq will never voluntarily disarm, the document also details areas where Iraq has been cooperating with inspectors, giving something to governments that want to give UNMOVIC more time. The report envisions a work program that extends beyond the end of March, what is generally viewed as the deadline for the beginning of military action against Iraq. “Without the required cooperation, disarmament and its verification will be problematic,” Blix wrote. “However, even with the requisite cooperation it will inevitably require some time.” The report was written before Iraq agreed to destroy its al-Samoud 2 missiles, which Blix on Friday called “a very significant piece of real disarmament” (see related GSN story, today). Continuing a theme from earlier reports, Blix distinguished between Iraqi cooperation on process and substance. On process, such as providing access to sites, “in general, Iraq has been helpful,” he wrote. But on substance, such as providing information on illegal weapons of mass destruction, the report says Iraq has been less forthcoming. The 12,000-page Dec. 7 declaration from Iraq on its programs for nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and long-range missile “has not been found to provide new evidence or data that may help to resolve outstanding disarmament issues,” other than information on the al-Samoud 2 missiles, according to the report. Blix said on most access questions, including use of helicopters and surveillance aircraft, Iraq was cooperating. However, on giving UNMOVIC unrestricted access to scientists, “the reality is that, so far, no persons not nominated by the Iraqi side have been willing to be interviewed without a tape recorder running or an Iraqi witness present.” Another issue is the list Iraq provided of people involved in what Baghdad described as the unilateral destruction of chemical and biological weapons Iraq was known to have at the end of the Gulf War in 1991. A batch of documents Iraq has provided that is supposed to detail that destruction is still being examined. On that topic, Blix wrote, “It is not possible to know whether they will prove to be a successful way to reduce uncertainty about the quantities unilaterally destroyed.” Although the United States is sending strong signals that it will push for a decision on its draft resolution within weeks, Blix lays out a program of work in the report that goes on at least until the end of March. UNMOVIC is completing “an internal document of some importance,” Blix wrote, which is a list of unresolved disarmament issues “and of the measures which Iraq could take to resolve them.” This list of “key remaining disarmament tasks” is required by Resolution 1284 and could “serve as a yardstick against which Iraq’s disarmament actions under Resolution 1441 may be measured,” wrote Blix. He is scheduled to brief the Security Council on his latest report, and developments that have occurred since, on March 7 (Jim Wurst, Global Security Newswire, March 3). Iraq to Prove VX, Anthrax Destruction Meanwhile, the United Nations has said that Iraq will submit a new report on its stockpiles of VX chemical agent and anthrax within a week. Iraqi officials and U.N. experts discussed yesterday Iraq’s proposal to submit “quantitative verification” that it has destroyed its VX and anthrax stockpiles. Iraq has been accused of failing to provide adequate information as to the destruction of banned weapons and materials. “Iraq will be providing a report on the VX and anthrax in a week’s time,” U.N. spokesman Hiro Ueki said (Nadim Ladki, Reuters, March 3). Inspections U.N. inspectors Friday conducted a private interview with an Iraqi biologist, the first non-nuclear-related interview since Feb. 7, Ueki said Saturday. Previously, Iraqi chemical and biological scientists had refused to grant interviews without recording the conversations. Ueki indicated that Friday’s interview was not taped (Associated Press/New York Times, March 2). U.N. inspectors visited at least six suspect Iraq sites today, according to the Associated Press. Inspectors visited a chemical and explosives plant, a rocket factory, two import companies and a plastics factory. They also visited al-Aziziya, where Iraq has said it destroyed bombs filled with biological agents in 1991 (Bassem Mroue, Associated Press/Yahoo.com, March 3). For further information, see: U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix’s current Security Council report (New York Times)
From March 3, 2003 issue.Iraq II: Report Documents Past U.S. Support for CW-Using IraqBy David Ruppe Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein, which draws on 61 declassified government documents and was published on the Internet last week by the nonprofit research organization the National Security Archive, concludes the Reagan administration chose to play down Iraq’s chemical weapons usage in favor of the maintaining good U.S.-Iraqi relations. “Chemical warfare was viewed as a potentially embarrassing public relations problem that complicated efforts to provide assistance,” the report says. Furthermore, it says the Reagan administration pursued the relationship despite knowledge of Iraqi human rights abuses, harboring of terrorists, and an interest in developing nuclear weapons. “The documents show that during this period of renewed U.S. support for [Iraqi President] Saddam [Hussein], he had invaded his neighbor (Iran), had long-range nuclear aspirations that would ‘probably’ include ‘an eventual nuclear capability,’ harbored known terrorists in Baghdad, abused the human rights of his citizens, and possessed and used chemical weapons on Iranians and his own people,” said a press release accompanying the report. The Bush administration currently is massing forces for a possible war against Iraq and is justifying its actions by citing many of those same issues. Two key differences in circumstances today, however, are that the United States and Iraq became outright enemies in 1990 after Iraq attacked Kuwait, kicking off the Gulf War, and that Iraq has for more than 10 years apparently failed to comply with numerous U.N. Security Council resolutions regarding disarmament and other issues. Joyce Battle, who edited the report, said the documents have relevance for the situation today. “If the U.S. goes to war with Iraq, many people will be put in harm’s way, and I think that we all should seek some understanding of earlier developments and policies that led us to the current situation,” she wrote in a publicized Internet chat to discuss the report. She said the contrast between the Reagan administration’s condemnation of Iraqi chemical weapons use and its continued support of Iraq, “encouraged Saddam Hussein to believe that the United States did not really believe, or act on, its public posture.” The report says the documents offer a noteworthy contrast between the reasoning currently offered by the Bush administration for its preparations for a possible war on Iraq and the policies pursued by Washington in the early 1980s. “The current Bush administration discusses Iraq in starkly moralistic terms to further its goal of persuading a skeptical world that a pre-emptive and premeditated attack on Iraq could and should be supported as a ‘just war,’” it says. “The documents in this briefing book reflect the realpolitik that determined this country’s policies during the years when Iraq was actually employing chemical weapons. … The U.S. was concerned with its ability to project military force in the Middle East, and to keep the oil flowing,” it said. U.S. Opposed Regime Change Goal Perhaps the most striking contrast between the policies of the Bush and Reagan administrations is their declared policies regarding regime change in Baghdad. The report includes a 1984 State Department press release that for the first time publicly condemned Iraq’s use of chemical weapons on Iranian forces, but which also condemned Iran’s goal of regime change in Baghdad. “While condemning Iraq’s chemical weapons use … the United States finds the present Iranian regime’s intransigent refusal to deviate from its avowed objective of eliminating the legitimate government of neighboring Iraq to be inconsistent with the accepted norms of behavior among nations and the moral and religious basis which it claims,” it said. The report says, though, “When asked whether the U.S.’s conclusion that Iraq had used chemical weapons would have ‘any effect on U.S. recent initiatives to expand commercial relationships with Iraq across a broad range, and also a willingness to open diplomatic relations,’ the department’s spokesperson said ‘No. I’m not aware of any change in our position. We’re interested in being involved in a closer dialogue with Iraq.’” Subsequent reporting has shown that the United States continued from 1986 to 1988 to allow then-legal, dual-use technology exports to Iraq that could aid its chemical and biological warfare efforts, such as bacterial strains for causing anthrax and gas gangrene, and for making botulinum toxin (see GSN, Oct. 2, 2002). Senator Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) asked Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld during a hearing last September, “Are we, in fact, now facing the possibility of reaping what we have sown?” Oil, Regional Balance a Concern Named for a now famous secret 1983 meeting between then-U.S. special envoy Rumsfeld and Saddam Hussein and including a photograph of that encounter, the report provides copies of 61 declassified documents offering details on the U.S.-Iraqi relationship from 1980 to 1984, most of which were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. Rumsfeld, then a former defense secretary, met with Hussein carrying a letter from [President Ronald] Reagan to Hussein, on a mission to bring the two governments closer together. The report shows that the Reagan administration was concerned greatly with preventing a disruption in the Persian Gulf oil flow and an Iraqi defeat, or a collapse of Hussein’s regime, by fundamentalist Islamic Iran. The report cites National Security Decision Directive 114 on the Iran-Iraq War, issued by Reagan in November 1983, which said the highest U.S. priority was to protect Gulf oil facilities. Not only at the time was there a concern Iran would defeat Iraq and gain greater control of the world’s oil, there was a concern Iraq would attempt to disrupt the oil flow to draw in greater powers to put an end to the conflict. The United States had no formal relations with Iraq since the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, when Iraq severed them. Hussein came to power, first as vice president, around 1968. In the early 1980s, the United States had an official policy of neutrality toward Iran and Iraq as they waged war. U.S. commerce with Iraq continued however, and there were signs of a thawing in U.S.-Iraqi government relations as early as 1981, with the scheduled visit of a State Department official to Baghdad and the U.S. interests section there declaring that the United States then had “a greater convergence of interests with Iraq than at any time since the revolution of 1958,” according to one document. Despite Persistent Terrorist Ties In 1982, the State Department removed Iraq from its list of countries supporting international terrorism. Still, in 1983, the State Department continued to urge Iraq to sever association with suspected terrorist groups. In May of that year, for instance, Secretary of State George Shultz sent a message to senior Iraqi official Tariq Aziz implying Iraq should dissociate itself from certain Palestinian groups it had supported, which he observed opposed both the U.S. and Iraqi governments. He added, “Several recent events lead me to believe that Iraq hesitates to cut its threads to international terrorists.” An October 1983 State Department report indicated the United States had covertly been practicing a “qualified tilt” toward Iraq, which included providing tactical intelligence and more to help prevent an Iraqi defeat. While U.S. policy barred military exports to Iraq, the report says the documents show U.S. companies were allowed to negotiate for potential deals to export potentially dual-use items such as trucks and helicopters to the Iraqi military. “Although official U.S. policy still barred the export of U.S. military equipment to Iraq, some was evidently provided on a “don’t ask, don’t tell” basis,” it says. In the spring of 1984, the administration deliberated on relaxing controls on dual-use exports judged “insignificant” for Iraq’s civilian nuclear agency, one document shows. A preliminary review, the document said, decided favorably towards relaxing the controls. A Defense Intelligence Agency report several months later warned that Iraq would probably “continue to develop its formidable conventional and chemical capability, and probably pursue nuclear weapons,” by first developing its civil nuclear program. Priorities Faulted The National Security Archives report faulted the Reagan administration largely for a lack of emphasis it said was placed on the chemical weapons issue. It says a 1984 directive expressed a determination to “avert an Iraqi collapse,” while also calling for “unambiguous” condemnation of chemical weapons use. It faulted the document, however, for not calling for specific condemnation of Iraqi chemical warfare and for “including the caveat that the U.S. should ‘place equal stress on the urgent need to dissuade Iran from continuing the ruthless and inhumane tactics which have characterized recent offensives.’” The report criticized the previously noted National Security Decision Directive 114, which addressed the administration concern about preserving the oil flow, for not including a “reference to chemical weapons.” The report also suggests Iraq persuaded the Reagan administration to water down a proposed U.N. Security Council condemnation of Iraq’s chemical weapons use in Iraq. Iraq’s senior diplomat in Washington urged the Security Council to issue a presidential statement, rather than a resolution, and that it not mention any country regarding chemical weapons use. An official said the United States could accept the Iraqi proposals if the Security Council went along and asked for the Iraqi government’s help “in avoiding … embarrassing situation[s]” and said the U.S. did “not want this issue to dominate our bilateral relationship.” After the statement was issued, a State Department memo later noted, “The statement, by the way contains all three elements [the Iraqi diplomat] wanted.” The report also contained a previously reported cable record of the 90-minute Rumsfeld-Hussein meeting, which, it says, contradicts a recent account of the meeting by Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld on Sept. 21, 2001, claimed he had “cautioned” Hussein during the meeting about using chemical weapons. “Rumsfeld met with Saddam, and the two discussed regional issues of mutual interest, shared enmity toward Iran and Syria, and the U.S.’s efforts to find alternative routes to transport Iraq’s oil; its facilities in the Persian Gulf had been shut down by Iran, and Iran’s ally, Syria, had cut off a pipeline that transported Iraqi oil through its territory,” the report said. “Rumsfeld made no reference to chemical weapons, according to detailed notes on the meeting,” it said, adding Rumsfeld raised the issue in a subsequent meeting with Aziz.
From March 3, 2003 issue.U.S. Response: Washington Should Triple Nonproliferation Funding, Campaign SaysBy David McGlinchey Washington should be promoting nonproliferation programs and avoiding efforts to develop new nuclear weapons, according to Representative Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), who spoke Wednesday at the annual meeting of the Energy Facilities Contractors Group. Tauscher criticized the U.S. Nuclear Posture Review, released January 2002, which diminishes the importance of nuclear retaliation but keeps alive the possibility of new U.S. nuclear weapons for use on the battlefield. “Rather than improve on past accomplishments, the United States is currently in a pattern of rejecting treaties, has put forth a Nuclear Posture Review that seems divorced from reality, and is making only paltry investments in nuclear nonproliferation,” Tauscher said. The United States should triple its nonproliferation budget and spend $30 billion over the next decade, she said. “To put this in perspective, for less than 1 percent of what the U.S. currently spends on defense, we can eliminate the risk of these deadly weapons falling into the hands of terrorists or rogue states,” according to Tauscher. The Nuclear Threat Reduction Campaign, a nonprofit advocacy group, has pushed the same initiative, calling for nonproliferation funding roughly equal to 1 percent of the Pentagon budget. Former Assistant Secretary of State Karl Inderfurth, a senior adviser to the group, made the 1 percent appeal Wednesday at a conference held by the Center for Defense Information and Physicians for Social Responsibility. Congressional Support Inderfurth, currently a professor at George Washington University, said that support for threat reduction campaigns and nonproliferation funding must be directed toward Congress. “That is the place we can get traction to do some of the things we want to do,” he said. The 1 percent message catches the ear of public groups, but it is “also resonating on the Hill,” NTRC Director Brian Finlay told Global Security Newswire. Speaking on the panel with Inderfurth, the Nuclear Threat Initiative’s Laura Holgate said that concerned arms control advocates must hold elected officials responsible for supporting arms control programs, such as the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program. “I like to say that Nunn-Lugar has destroyed way more Soviet missiles than even the wildest claims of missile defense,” she said. Tauscher Criticizes Moscow Treaty Tauscher said that the Moscow Treaty, officially known as the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty, could decrease international security. “To make matters much worse, the new Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty will, ironically, make nuclear security problems worse because it does not commit either nation to actually destroying a single nuclear weapon. Instead, it will allow the United States and Russia to merely store weapons — like putting a car on blocks in a garage — leaving more nuclear parts in more locations where they will likely be less secure,” she said. [EDITOR'S NOTE: The Nuclear Threat Initiative is the sole sponsor of Global Security Newswire, which is published independently by National Journal Group, Inc.]
From March 3, 2003 issue.Iraq III: Summary of InspectionsExperts from the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission and the International Atomic Energy Agency have conducted hundreds of inspections in Iraq since resuming the post-Gulf War inspection regime Nov. 27. About 100 inspectors are now based in the country at two facilities in Baghdad and Mosul. The following chart summarizes some of the inspectors’ recently reported activities.
From February 26, 2003 issue.Iraq I: U.S. Ramps Up Pressure as Iraq Discloses BW BombWith a new Iraqi disclosure that it will turn over two bombs to U.N. inspectors, including one that possibly contains biological weapons agents, U.N. Security Council members were anticipating a heavy U.S. diplomatic onslaught to obtain their support for a new resolution on Iraq issued this week, council diplomats said (see GSN, Feb. 25). At least six nonpermanent members — Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea, Mexico and Pakistan — are still undecided on supporting the new resolution and are preparing for intense U.S. pressure to do so, USA Today reported. “There’s an old saying that in good times, your friends find out who you are; in bad times, you find out who your friends are,” U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Tony Garza said last week. There are several ways the United States could attempt to influence the decisions of the wavering council members, including by offering defense cooperation, trade deals and loans from international institutions, said James Paul, director of the Global Policy Forum. “There’s no end to it,” Paul said. “Everything we know about negotiations from the past suggests that’s how things play out,” he added. The still-undecided members have several historical examples to consider as they try to assess the risks of opposing the United States, according to USA Today. For example, when Yemen cast one of two dissenting votes against a 1990 U.N. resolution authorizing the Gulf War, the United States almost immediately canceled a $70 million aid package. During last year’s negotiations over U.N. Resolution 1441, which established the current inspections regime, the United States complained of weak support from Mauritius, which was a council member at the time. In response, Mauritius recalled its U.N. ambassador, who was publicly criticized for failing to express his country’s support for the U.S. plan (Bill Nichols, USA Today, Feb. 26). At least two of the three undecided African council members — Angola and Guinea — might decide to back the United States, according to diplomats and international observers. Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos is considered the most likely to succumb to U.S. pressure, according to the Financial Times. Angola is counting on international loans to help fund the costs of reconstruction after the country’s long civil war. Dos Santos might also feel indebted to the United States over rumored U.S. aid in providing intelligence leading to the killing last year of Angolan rebel leader Jonas Savimbi, the Times reported. Angola’s U.N. Ambassador Ismael Gaspar Martins indicated yesterday that a compromise could be reached on the new resolution. “The cards are on the table,” Martins was quoted as saying. “Now I think we need to sit down jointly and come out with ... a common solution,” he added. Guinea is also considered to be a possible U.S. supporter because of its weak post-colonial relationship with France, a key opponent of the United States in the Security Council, according to the Times (White/Lamont, Financial Times, Feb. 25). Mexico also appears to be moving to back the United States, according to a new foreign policy directive obtained by the Associated Press. Soon after an address yesterday by Mexican President Vicente Fox, the Mexican Foreign Ministry issued the directive to its embassies outlining a new position based solely on Mexico’s main “national interest” — its relationship with the United States, AP reported. While the directive does not explicitly say that Mexico will vote for the U.S.-supported resolution, it does say that Mexico will now focus solely on the disarmament of Iraq. “Nothing is more urgent, no time can be lost in achieving this objective,” the directive said (Dafna Linzer, Associated Press/Los Angeles Times, Feb. 26). The remaining permanent Security Council members, however, still appear to be strongly against the U.S.-British-supported resolution. U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton said yesterday after talks with Russian officials in Moscow that Russia had not changed its stance. “I didn’t detect any shift in their (Russia’s) position,” Bolton said, following two days of meetings. Bolton indicated that the United States will continue to attempt to gain Russia’s support for the new resolution, saying his visit “is not the last of the diplomatic discussions” (People’s Daily, Feb. 26). New Signs of Iraqi Cooperation “Positive,” Blix Says Meanwhile, U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix said yesterday that there were “positive” elements in six letters Iraq has recently sent to the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission. These “new elements” still needed to be “followed up” by inspectors, Blix said. One of the letters says that Iraq has discovered handwritten documents related to the disposal of prohibited items in 1991, Blix said. Another letter details the discovery of an R-400 bomb containing liquid, which was found at a known former biological weapons disposal site, he added (United Press International, Feb. 25). The R-400 bomb is equipped to hold about 20 gallons of liquid and Iraq has previously admitted to using such weapons to test biological agents, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Iraq is believed to have used such bombs in biological and chemical weapons attacks against Iranian troops and its Kurdish population (Bob Deans, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Feb. 26). U.S. President George W. Bush discounted the new Iraqi admissions, saying it was just another attempt by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to fool the international community into thinking he is comply with inspections. “I suspect that he will try to fool the world one more time. After all, he has had a history of doing that for 12 years,” Bush said. “I suspect we’ll see him playing games ... The world will say disarm, and he will all of a sudden find a weapon that he claimed he didn’t have,” he added (Blomquist/Orin, New York Post, Feb. 26). War Costs The White House is preparing a number of supplemental spending requests totaling up to $95 billion to cover the cost of a war with Iraq and the aftermath, officials said (see GSN, Dec. 31, 2002). The total cost might be only about $60 billion because defense officials do not yet know how long a war with Iraq would last or what, if any, support other countries will provide, according to the Wall Street Journal. The $95 billion amount indicates that the total costs for war and reconstruction could reach an earlier estimate of more than $100 billion — an estimate that shocked members of Congress at the time. Pentagon officials want Congress to approve at least some of the supplemental funding before it goes into recess April 10. White House and Pentagon officials are divided over whether the funding requests should be combined into one large bill or broken up into smaller, separate pieces of legislation, the Journal reported. White House officials favor preparing two or more bills in order to provide greater control over spending and to reduce the political effect because each request would be relatively small. Pentagon officials favor one large bill that would include funding for both the war and the reconstruction of Iraq to prevent a disruption of funding at the end of the current fiscal year (Jaffe/McKinnon, Wall Street Journal, Feb. 26). Some officials close to the financial planning process have said that military planners do not have a firm idea as to what the total cost of a war with Iraq might be, leading to frustrations within the White House. “It’s like watching numbers roll higher and higher on a slot machine,” a State Department official said. During recent interagency meetings, White House budget aides put their hands over their ears and said, “‘We’re not listening,’” the official said. “We can’t take any more requests. Get a grip on this process and figure out exactly what you’re planning,” the official remembered the aides as saying. “They basically said, ‘Get ahold of yourselves,’” the official added (Gosselin/Wright, Los Angeles Times, Feb. 26). United States Continues Airstrikes U.S. aircraft yesterday attacked conducted two attacks on Iraqi mobile missile systems in the southern part of the country, according to the U.S. military. The first airstrike involved the bombing of a surface-to-air missile site near al-Basrah, about 245 miles southeast of Baghdad. The second strike involved the bombing of a surface-to-surface missile system that was also located near al-Basrah (United Press International II, Feb. 25). Inspections U.N. inspectors visited at least 13 suspect Iraqi sites yesterday, according to an International Atomic Energy Agency press release. UNMOVIC missile inspectors visited five sites: al-Rasheed Company, al-Fatah Factory, the Electronic Base factory, al-Kadhimiya Company and al-Qa Qaa Storage site. Inspectors visited al-Falha Egg Production Company, according to the IAEA release. UNMOVIC chemical inspectors visited the Baji underground refinery. UNMOVIC biological conducted two inspections at Mosul University’s College of Agriculture and Forestry, including the Department of Food Technology and the Department of Plant Protection. UNMOVIC biological inspectors also visited the Khalil customs post and the Mosul Ammunition Storage Facility. IAEA inspectors conducted a radiation survey at Nida, the agency release said. IAEA inspectors also visited al-Tahdi electronics research and electrical repair factory. As of yesterday, there were 97 inspectors operating within Iraq, 84 from UNMOVIC and 13 from the IAEA (IAEA release, Feb. 25). For further information, see:
From February 26, 2003 issue.Iraq II: Summary of InspectionsExperts from the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission and the International Atomic Energy Agency have conducted hundreds of inspections in Iraq since resuming the post-Gulf War inspection regime Nov. 27. More than 200 U.N. personnel, including about 100 inspectors, are now based in the country at two facilities in Baghdad and Mosul. The following chart summarizes some of the inspectors’ recently reported activities.
From February 25, 2003 issue.Iraq I: U.S. Says One Question Left: Will the U.N. Support a Certain War?Two competing proposals on Iraq were introduced yesterday to the U.N. Security Council, but U.S. officials indicated that the United States would go to war regardless of how the council votes on the resolution. The sole outstanding issue for the Bush administration was whether the council would support the war or cast itself into irrelevance, officials said (see GSN, Feb. 24). In meetings with officials from Security Council members, U.S. officials have indicated that the decision to go to war has already been made, according to the Washington Post. For example, in meetings with Russian officials yesterday, Undersecretary of State John Bolton said the United States was going ahead with war regardless of the Security Council’s decision and that the U.S. focus was on maintaining the unity of the council, a senior Bush administration official said. A senior diplomat from another Security Council member said his government had also been told to not worry about making a decision on possibly launching war. “You are not going to decide whether there is war in Iraq or not,” the diplomat said U.S. officials told him. “That decision is ours, and we have already made it. It is already final. The only question now is whether the council will go along with it or not,” the diplomat added, quoting the U.S. officials. The United States has been conducting a high-level diplomatic campaign to rally the support of a majority of the Security Council for a new resolution introduced yesterday, according to the Post. So far, however, only Spain and Bulgaria have openly sided with the United States and the United Kingdom on the new resolution. Out of the 10 nonpermanent members, Germany and Syria are considered as being solidly in the “no” column. Pakistan is believed to be going to vote no or abstain, the Post reported. While the United States appears willing to accept a 9-2 vote in favor of the new resolution, with four abstentions, other council members have said such a result would equal a false victory. The resolution has to be adopted by “an important majority,” including most of the five permanent members, to maintain any sense of relevance, a nonpermanent council member diplomat said. “This idea of putting three members with veto power on the outside is not something that sounds much like unity,” the diplomat said. “Are they going to declare the Security Council “relevant” by virtue of submission by the smallest states?” the diplomat added (Karen DeYoung, Washington Post, Feb. 25). A New Resolution and a Memorandum Introduced With U.S. and Spanish support, the United Kingdom introduced the new draft resolution yesterday, formally charging that Iraq is still in violation of its disarmament obligations. If adopted, the resolution would have the council decide “that Iraq has failed to take the final opportunity afforded it in Resolution 1441” to eliminate its weapons of mass destruction — which would likely lead to war. Resolution 1441, agreed to unanimously by the council in November, gives Iraq a final opportunity to disarm or face “serious consequences.” At the same time, France began circulating a two-page memorandum calling for “reinforced inspections” with timelines for Iraq’s cooperation on a schedule that could extend into the summer. The paper, supported by Germany and Russia, says, “Our priority should be to achieve [disarmament] peacefully through the inspection regime. The military option should only be a last resort. So far, the conditions for using force against Iraq are not fulfilled.” The memorandum is not a draft resolution. Rather, it is more of a counterpoint to the British draft. The authors of the memo say a second resolution is not needed. According to Ambassador Gunter Pleuger of Germany, the memo “is based on the present system of Security Council resolutions and therefore we feel we do not need a second resolution right now.” Pleuger said the memorandum “proposes things that have been proposed earlier [by the three governments] and have been repeated by the European Union on Feb. 17, that is, we have the common goal to disarm Iraq in a peaceful way.” British Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock, in introducing the draft resolution yesterday, told the council, “Today, 15 weeks on from 1441, we are no further advanced towards that objective of complete disarmament.” He said the council was seeing “an all-too-familiar pattern of Iraq trying to get us to focus on small concessions of process, rather than on the big picture. The cardinal point is that there is no semblance of wholehearted cooperation, nothing like voluntary and active disarmament.” The one-page draft resolution does not explicitly authorize using force against Iraq, but that is the clear implication of the paper because the bulk of the draft details how Iraq has not cooperated with weapons inspectors. The draft would have the council decide “that Iraq has failed to take the final opportunity afforded it in resolution 1441.” It does not give any deadlines, so passage of the resolution could be enough to trigger the use of force. Speaking to reporters, U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte said, “We have not seen what this council insisted on seeing — a strategic decision by Iraq to disarm. That is the bar set by Resolution 1441 and Iraq is immensely far from reaching that bar and we all know it.” French Ambassador Jean-Marc de la Sabliere countered, “The time has not come to discuss a military option. We do think that the use of force should be the last resort. We have never ruled out the use of force, but we have always stated that it should be the last resort.” The French memorandum calls for more inspections and invokes the timeline established in Resolution 1284, adopted in December 1999. The memo says the inspectors should create a program of work that would identify “the key remaining disarmament tasks to be completed by Iraq.” Following on from 1284, the inspectors would then have 120 days to pursue inspections before presenting a new report on Iraqi cooperation to the council. Such a timeline, if immediately enacted, would push a possible invasion off to the hottest time of the year in the Middle East. The paper also says the inspection regime should include more inspectors, mobile inspections units and increased aerial surveillance. “We are saying that while Iraq is not yet fully cooperating, Iraq is making some progress,” de la Sabliere said. “Inspections are making some results. We must have a timeline.” Russian Ambassador Sergei Lavrov told journalists, “We don’t think the chance for the peaceful disarmament of Iraq has been lost or missed. We are convinced on the contrary that the inspections are proceeding effectively and that Iraq is responding to the demands of the international community and to the pressure exerted on it and we think that this should continue.” Negroponte said the French memo “is much more process than substance. We don’t see it as contributing to the disarmament of Iraq. We view that paper with deep skepticism.” The next report by the head of the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, Hans Blix, is due March 1, the same day Iraq must begin destroying its missiles that exceed the range permitted by the council (see related GSN story, today). The council is scheduled to meet March 7 to discuss the latest reports from Blix and the International Atomic Energy Agency. A drive for a vote on the draft resolution could follow at time after that, diplomats said. Greenstock told journalists, “We haven’t set a date because we’re not setting an ultimatum in those terms.” He added, “There is still an opportunity to avert conflict. But the council’s judgment that Iraq has made the wrong choice should be clear and consensual.” Syrian Ambassador Mikhail Wehbe said that as an Arab country, “we could not accept such a draft resolution to come at this stage and as a declaration of war against the Iraqi people. We are not going to support such a resolution, as Resolution 1441 has not been exhausted fully.” At one level, this is a debate about the relative value of two council resolutions governing the activities of the inspectors. Resolution 1284 created UNMOVIC and laid out a program of work and a timetable for the inspectors once they got back into Iraq following the departure of UNMOVIC’s predecessor, the U.N. Special Commission, in 1998. Resolution 1441 gave the inspectors authority for a more intrusive regime and warned Iraq of “serious consequences” if it did not fully cooperate with UNMOVIC and the IAEA. An element of the debate is how much value the earlier resolution still has. “The problem about the memorandum and its wish for a much longer period of inspections under Resolution 1284 is that it sets aside the extra pressure which is being produced by 1441,” Greenstock said. Lavrov, however, said Resolution 1284 “is part of international law. Unless explicitly cancelled by the council, it remains the basis for the inspectors work, together with 1441. There is no contradiction.” The council will continue its debate tomorrow over the two conflicting initiatives (Jim Wurst, Global Security Newswire, Feb. 25). Inspectors’ Security Council Briefing IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei will present his report on nuclear inspections within Iraq to the Security Council at the same time as the March 7 Blix briefing, IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said today. ElBaradei had originally been scheduled to hold a separate briefing on April 11, according to Reuters (Reuters/MSNBC.com, Feb. 25). Blix met yesterday with the U.N. College of Commissioners, an advisory board, to review the report he will present to the Security Council on the status of weapons inspections in Iraq. The meetings are scheduled to last through today (U.N. press release, Feb. 24). Inspections U.N. inspectors visited at least 19 suspect Iraqi sites yesterday, according to an IAEA press release. UNMOVIC missile inspectors tagged SA-2 missiles that had undergone maintenance at the al-Harith Company. They also inspected al-Rasheed Company, al-Qaid Factory, al-Eyz State Company and al-Mutasim Factory. UNMOVIC chemical inspectors conducted a rebaselining inspection at the Baghdad Institute of Technology, according to the IAEA release. UNMOVIC biological inspectors visited an airfield and a munitions test range, both located southwest of Baghdad. They also inspected munitions fragments at an old destruction site. Biological experts inspected the Environmental Engineering Laboratory at Mosul University’s Department of Civil Engineering and shelters and bunkers related to the Mosul Airfield. IAEA inspectors conducted a radiation survey in an area southwest of Baghdad, the agency release said. They also inspected the use of high-strength magnets at al-Midlad State Company, formerly known as al-Furat; al-Karama site; al-Razzi State Company, formerly known as Taji Laser; and al-Yarmook site (IAEA release, Feb. 24). For further information, see:
From February 25, 2003 issue.U.S. Response: Regan Escapes Death PenaltyA U.S. federal jury decided yesterday that Brian Regan had not attempted to sell U.S. war plans or information on specific weapons systems, including nuclear weapons, the Washington Post reported today (see GSN, Feb. 21). Regan was convicted last week on two counts of attempted espionage and one count of gathering national defense information, the Post reported. If the jury had agreed that he had attempted to sell specific information, Regan would have been eligible for the death penalty. He could face up to life in prison May 9, when he is scheduled to be sentenced. “As much as I am disappointed that he was convicted, I am so proud of this jury for not collapsing in this time of fear of terror,” said Jonathan Shapiro, one of Regan’s lawyers. “This should never have been a death penalty case to begin with. That message was sent loud and clear,” he added. A juror agreed with Shapiro, saying the prosecution did not produce enough evidence. “We weren’t even considering what the punishment would be,” the juror said (Jerry Markon, Washington Post, Feb. 25).
From February 25, 2003 issue.Iraq II: Summary of InspectionsExperts from the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission and the International Atomic Energy Agency have conducted hundreds of inspections in Iraq since resuming the post-Gulf War inspection regime Nov. 27. More than 200 U.N. personnel, including about 150 inspectors, are now based in the country at two facilities in Baghdad and Mosul. The following chart summarizes some of the inspectors’ recently reported activities.
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