BAGHDAD/MOSCOW, 16 January 2003 — UN inspectors got tougher with Iraq in word and deed yesterday, hunting for banned weapons in President Saddam Hussein’s main palace and demanding active help from Iraq so they could get the job done. “I intend ... to impress upon Iraq the need to shift gear from passive cooperation to active cooperation,” Mohammed El-Baradei, head of the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency, told reporters in Moscow.
Baghdad described the move as a “clear act of provocation.” “The visit to the Al-Tashari area close to the presidential palace at 0651 GMT is a clear act of provocation to harass (Iraq) and approach several important sites linked to national security,” an Iraqi Foreign Ministry spokesman said. The palace “has no link whatsoever to the process of disarmament or previous armament programs,” the spokesman said in a statement.
The UN experts gained immediate access to the palace, and one of their cars blocked the entrance. The visit, lasting more than four hours, was the UN inspectors’ second use of strengthened new powers denied to their predecessors to make no-notice inspections of Iraq’s eight “sensitive” presidential sites. The site chosen was the 2.5-square-kilometer Republican Palace, considered of special interest as the location of Saddam Hussein’s main office. The palace was bombed several times by US-led coalition warplanes during the 1991 Gulf War.
It also houses offices of the Special Security Forces, which protect Baghdad’s ruling elite, and the Republican Guard, a well-trained and loyal military force. Unlike last time, reporters were kept out by guards as experts from the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission and the International Atomic Energy Agency drove into the compound.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said yesterday that war with Iraq was not inevitable, saying Saddam Hussein could instead choose to disarm. “We continue to hope that he will change course,” Rumsfeld said. “No one wants war. The choice between war and peace will not be made in Washington, or for that matter in New York, but in Baghdad.” He said that Iraqi disarmament, as demanded by the United Nations, “could happen in a variety of ways besides war,” suggesting that Saddam could flee the country or chose to cooperate with inspectors.
Meanwhile, Arab interior and information ministers meeting in Tunis yesterday affirmed Arab countries’ total opposition to attack on Iraq. The ministers said they considered the planned attack as a threat to the national security of all Arab countries.
The joint meeting emphasized the need for protecting Iraq’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. It urged the international community to remove weapons of mass destruction from the Middle East region without exempting any country including Israel. It called for a full-fledged plan to prevent crimes in Arab society and urged all member states to cooperate in the fight against terrorism.
While Washington raised the volume on the war of words with Baghdad, news emerged from Moscow and Cairo of bids to avert war itself. US President George W. Bush said he was “sick and tired” of what he called Iraq’s games and deception in the face of a UN Security Council resolution demanding it disarm or face the possibility of “serious consequences”, meaning war.
Russia, which has close ties with Baghdad, said its leading Iraq expert would go to Baghdad, perhaps as early as today. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, his country a close US ally, would meet Saddam’s cousin on Saturday, Egyptian media said.
“Time is running out on Saddam Hussein. He must disarm,” Bush insisted on Tuesday while the United States poured warplanes, ships and tens of thousands of troops into the oil-rich Gulf region. El-Baradei has said he and fellow top UN inspector Hans Blix are going to Baghdad this weekend for some tough talking on whether Iraq has chemical, biological or nuclear weapons or long-range missiles. The talks will be key to a major report that Blix and El-Baradei are due to make to the Security Council on Jan. 27 on Iraqi compliance.
“While the international community is ready to give us some more time, I am also aware that there is a certain degree of impatience in the international community,” El-Baradei said. “We are going to intensify our inspection process in the next few weeks and months.” Russia said its deputy foreign minister and leading Iraq expert, Alexander Saltanov, would travel to Baghdad in a bid to find a diplomatic solution.
Egyptian media said Mubarak would meet Saddam’s cousin Ali Hassan Al-Majeed, a member of Iraq’s Revolutionary Command Council, in Cairo. Egypt wants to avert a war it fears will inflame the Middle East. (Agencies)
