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11/14 17:59 FOCUS-U.S. slams Iraqi arms inspection offer
(Updates with Berger news conference, Blair in London)
LONDON, Nov 14 (Reuters) - The United States on Saturday rejected as unacceptable an Iraqi letter offering to resume cooperation with U.N. arms inspectors and said it remained poised for military action to make Baghdad comply.
"The Iraqi letter...is neither unequivocal nor unconditional. It is unacceptable," U.S. National Security Adviser Sandy Berger told reporters at a White House news conference.
He heaped scorn on the letter and the accompanying nine-point annex that Iraq sent U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, saying Washington wanted an unequivocal response from Baghdad. "What we have instead is a letter and particularly an annex that's got more holes than Swiss cheese," he said.
In London, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, whose country is providing air and sea backup for the U.S.-led military buildup in the Gulf, told reporters earlier that "nothing less than unconditional compliance will do". Speaking outside his Downing Street office, Blair, in a reference to the Iraqi letter's annex, added: "Any conditions of this nature are unacceptable. Compliance with the agreement must be absolute. There can be no negotiations, no further deals, no more amendments to what they have agreed."
U.S. President Bill Clinton, meanwhile, abruptly cancelled plans to attend an economic summit in Malaysia in order to deal with Iraq, his chief spokesman, Joe Lockhart, said. Vice President Al Gore would go in his place.
The big U.S. military buildup in the Gulf continued apace on Saturday.
In New York, the U.N. Security Council was convening to discuss the high-profile Iraqi offer to let U.N. arms inspectors resume the task of making certain Baghdad was destroying its weapons of mass destruction.
While some diplomats said the annex might be interpreted as setting conditions, Iraqi U.N. envoy Nizar Hamdoon, who had delivered the letter to Annan earlier on Saturday, told Reuters it was "a wish list. These are not conditions," he added,
Annan told reporters in New york before Berger's news conference in Washington that the annex "was for our consideration and there were no conditions". Asked if the letter met U.N. requirements, he said "Yes, in my judgment it does."
The annex sets out Iraq's view of how a promised comprehensive council review of Baghdad's relations with the United Nations should be conducted.
Iraq wants the review to lead to the speedy lifting of sanctions in force since its August 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
It not only wants curbs on Iraqi exports -- including oil -- lifted when U.N. arms inspectors certify all its weapons of mass destruction have been accounted for, but says the council should meanwhile implement "measures for lifting or reducing sanctions in proportion" to what has been fulfilled so far.
The annex also says the council should seriously consider "the question of Butler and the structure of UNSCOM" -- a reference to the U.N. Special Commission in charge of disarming Iraq and its chief, Richard Butler, whom Baghdad wants fired.
Diplomats said Iraq's constant demands that Butler be dismissed was a near-guarantee that neither the council nor Annan could release him from his post. Otherwise Baghdad would be in a position to dictate the composition of U.N. arms teams.
Russia, which has long-standing ties with Baghdad and which has consistently opposed military strikes against Iraq, hailed the Iraqi announcement and claimed a decisive role in Baghdad's change of heart over the space of 24 hours after two weeks of deepening crisis.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Viktor Posuvalyuk told Reuters in Moscow that his country believed Aziz's letter to Annan contained a clear message that Iraq was agreeing to allow the U.N. inspectors to renew their normal work.
"We believe that this opens a real path for political settlement and correspondingly eliminates the possibility of using military force," Posuvalyuk added.
Moscow's objections in the buildup to the latest crisis have been seen in the West as less forceful. China and France have also supported a diplomatic rather than military resolution of the latest crisis.
In Beirut, visiting Austrian Foreign Minister Wolfgang Schuessel said the European Union would support an Annan mission to Iraq if President Saddam Hussein showed "flexibility".
"Kofi Annan has the right to ask for full compliance of Iraq with the United Nations Security Council resolutions and if that is the case we would give him full support for a mission to negotiate with Baghdad," Schuessel, whose country currently holds the EU's rotating presidency, told reporters.
French President Jacques Chirac, speaking to reporters on a visit to Mexico, said: "Iraq must resume without delay its cooperation with the U.N. and it will not be until this cooperation has actually resumed that one can say the crisis is over."
France declined to participate in any military strike this time but has made no public criticism of the U.S. approach.
In the Gulf, early reaction to Iraq's letter was positive. A Qatari foreign ministry official in Doha told Reuters: "It is good news to the Arab nation and the Gulf states. It is good to see reason and people's interest taken into consideration."
The United Arab Emirates foreign minister, Rashed Abdullah al-Nuaimi, told reporters on the sidelines of a meeting of Gulf Arab foreign ministers in Abu Dhabi that he hoped the Iraqi move would lead to stability in the region and alleviate the suffering of the Iraqi people.
An Israeli official, interviewed by telephone, said: "Although this is clearly a matter being dealt with by the U.N., we would welcome Iraqi compliance and cooperation with UNSCOM. Apart from this, I don't see any Israeli involvement in this matter." |
