JEDDAH, 5 March 2003 — Saudi Arabia has taken precautions against an influx of refugees into the Kingdom in case of a US-led war on Iraq, Interior Minister Prince Naif announced here yesterday.

Speaking to reporters after attending a graduation ceremony at Jeddah Police’s training and mobilization center, Prince Naif said the Kingdom’s security agencies were prepared for any eventuality.

Asked whether Riyadh had taken precautionary measures to protect its people from a possible nuclear attack during the war, he said the Kingdom would counter such attacks like other countries.

He said the Kingdom would not evacuate its citizens from Kuwait in case of war. “Not at all. They will be like their Kuwaiti brothers,” the minister said.

Yesterday, the United States ordered 60,000 more troops to the Gulf as Iran suggested a UN-supervised referendum to effect a power transition in Iraq. President Saddam Hussein has dismissed any proposal that he give up power, including Arab suggestions that he go into exile.

Iraq showed both cooperation and defiance in its efforts to head off an invasion that Washington says will rid it of banned weapons. It scrapped more Al-Samoud 2 missiles, but President Saddam Hussein forecast victory in any war and branded US President George W. Bush the “despot of the century”.

Iraq has been destroying Al-Samoud 2 missiles whose range UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix says exceeds the 150-km (93-mile) limit set by UN resolutions after the 1991 Gulf War. The UN said Iraq destroyed three more of the missiles yesterday, bringing to 19 the number scrapped since Baghdad began Saturday to junk its 120-missile arsenal.

Turkey’s surprise decision not to let US troops launch an attack on neighboring Iraq from its soil has upset plans for a mid-March invasion, but Ankara indicated a new parliamentary vote could be held.

US defense officials announced the dispatch of the fresh troops to join a more than 250,000-strong US and British force as a divided UN Security Council considered whether to approve a new draft resolution authorizing war. The Security Council will hold on Friday a public meeting at foreign minister level with Blix and Mohammed El-Baradei, the UN’s nuclear watchdog.

Washington has signaled it will push for the new resolution to a vote next week despite misgivings in the 15-member Council. Big powers France, Russia and China say UN arms inspectors in Iraq must be given more time, and Moscow has threatened to use its veto in the Council.

“Russia has this right and if the situation so demands, Russia will of course use its right of veto — as an extreme measure — to avoid the worst development of the situation,” Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said, according to a translated version of a BBC World Service interview in London.

“Russia would not support any decision that would directly or indirectly lead to a war with Iraq,” he added.

Whatever the outcome of a vote, US officials and defense experts say Turkey’s opposition to up to 60,000 US troops launching a “northern front” against Iraq from its territory could delay an attack until late March or early April.

They say Saturday’s decision by Turkey’s Parliament could also spark problems over control of northern Iraq’s oil fields, which could be destroyed by Iraq or seized by Kurds in the Kurdish-controlled region. — Additional input from Reuters