France Rejects Move to End NATO Crisis
BRUSSELS (Feb. 12) - France shot down a compromise on Wednesday aimed at breaking NATO's deadlock over planning protection for Turkey in case of a U.S.-led war on Iraq, dashing hopes for an early end to the alliance's damaging crisis.
Diplomats said France, Germany and Belgium, which vetoed broader proposals on Monday, were unlikely to budge at least until after chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix reports to the Security Council on Friday.
In a bid to calm one of the most serious storms in NATO's 54-year history, NATO Secretary-General George Robertson presented a slimmed-down ''decision sheet,'' stripped of plans to protect U.S. forces in Europe or replace Balkan peacekeepers sent to fight in Iraq.
''The general view now is that we have a sound basis to continue consultations further,'' NATO spokesman Yves Brodeur told a briefing after a night of intense telephone diplomacy.
A NATO official said there would be another session of the 19-nation North Atlantic Council -- the fifth in three days of wrangling at 2 p.m. EST.
But a French Foreign Ministry spokesman, asked about the Robertson proposal, said Paris's position had not changed.
''In this regard, we cannot, through a NATO decision, give our support in principle to a military intervention in Iraq and thus pre-empt the decisions of the Security Council,'' he said.
THREE HANG TOUGH
In the first NATO council of the day, France, Germany and Belgium explained again why they had vetoed proposals to start planning to deploy Patriot air defence missiles, early warning planes and anti-chemical and germ warfare units to Turkey.
''The three repeated their position, they are undivided,'' said one. ''They have committed themselves to studying the new text but they are basically repeating their stand.''
The European trio argue that starting defence planning now would lock NATO into a ''logic of war,'' implicitly accepting that an armed conflict against Iraq is inevitable.
Officials said Robertson cancelled a trip to Spain scheduled for Thursday to handle the crisis at alliance headquarters in Brussels. In an ironic twist, he had been due to deliver a speech in Madrid on ''NATO and the challenges of the future.''
The United States appeared to concede that there was no end in sight to a faceoff which has fuelled tension with countries whose arguments against war prompted U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld last month to brand them ''old Europe.''
''It may take some time for us to get to the end of the discussion, that wouldn't be surprising,'' U.S. ambassador to NATO Nicholas Burns told reporters.
NATO officials said dissenters would probably spin out negotiations until after Blix reports to the Security Council, hoping that signs of improved Iraqi cooperation could vindicate their anti-war stance.
''People are starting to realise that there will be no solution before Friday and that perhaps it is not good for NATO to continue like this,'' said a diplomat for one of the trio.
Turkey, which shares a frontier with Iraq and is a likely launch pad for any U.S. attack, is anxious for NATO to start planning without delay.
When France, Germany and Belgium formally objected to the plan on Monday, Ankara invoked Article IV of NATO's founding treaty under which allies seek consultations if they fear they are under threat.
The United States accuses the three countries of importing political arguments made at the U.N. Security Council against military action into NATO, an organisation which has a duty to make contingency plans for the defence of one of its members. |
