WASHINGTON, 25 January 2003 — Iraq’s refusal to allow UN inspectors unfettered interviews with its weapons scientists yesterday emerged as the key issue which could tip an increasingly impatient US into military action against George W. Bush deems Iraq’s non-cooperation “unacceptable,” his spokesman Ari Fleischer declared. “This is not a matter for negotiation, this is not a matter for debate. Saddam Hussein has no choice in the matter.”

The warning from the White House came 72 hours before the fateful report to the Security Council on the first two months’ work of the inspectors. Though this is likely to be inconclusive — a “mixed bag” in the words of Hans Blix, the chief UN inspector — the Bush administration will see it as confirmation Iraq has not got rid of its chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.

Instead US officials are seizing on the two areas where Baghdad seems to be digging in its heels: its refusal to allow the UN to operate U-2 spy plane flights over its territory, and the lack of full access to the scientists.

Iraq’s version is that the scientists voluntarily ask for Iraqi minders to be present at the interviews, and of their own accord decline to leave the country for the talks. But the administration says they are too scared to talk.

“We know from multiple sources that Saddam has ordered that any scientist who cooperates during interviews will be killed, along with their families,” Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense, said this week.

In a bid to meet the allies’ demand for proof, a senior US official declared yesterday that Washington had “very convincing evidence” that Iraq has an extensive weapons program, which it would present “at the appropriate moment.” According to John Bolton, undersecretary of State for arms control, Saddam’s clandestine arsenal included long-range missiles, which have been banned for Iraq since the 1991 Gulf War, as well as the secret chemical and biological weapons which Washington maintains Saddam still possesses.

But with the US seemingly bent on war, perhaps within a month, the split on the Security Council is if anything widening. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Germany’s Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder yesterday agreed to oppose military intervention.

Though Secretary of State Colin Powell said it remained “an open question,” a second resolution declaring Saddam in definitive breach of his obligations under Resolution 1441, and explicitly authorizing the use of force, looks more unlikely than ever.

But there was fresh indication yesterday that Washington had decided to go it alone if it came to that. A senior State Department official said the United States is advising its expatriate citizens around the world to be prepared for emergency evacuations from their country of residence in the event of war, natural disasters or other unforeseen circumstances. The official said the department had sent diplomatic cables to all US embassies and consulates abroad instructing them to alert Americans in their jurisdictions to be ready for any eventuality amid the increasing possibility of military action in Iraq.

“We thought it was appropriate to remind people to take ordinary and routine precautions,” the official told reporters on condition of anonymity.

The Pentagon warned that if war broke out, the US military had plans to secure Iraq’s oilfields, and prevent a repeat of what happened 12 years ago, when Iraqi troops set fire to Kuwait’s oil wells when they were driven out.

Meanwhile, a group of more than 100 legal experts warned Bush in a letter that senior officials could face prosecution if US soldiers committed war crimes in Iraq. The experts said violations of international humanitarian law by US and allied forces “were extensively documented” during the 1991 Gulf War and military campaigns in Kosovo in 1999 and in Afghanistan in late 2001. “Given these past violations, there is a reasonable basis for assuming that in any future military action against Iraq, these requirements will once again be breached,” they wrote. The letter was signed by more than 100 law professors and non-governmental organizations. (The Independent & agencies)