KUWAIT CITY, 8 March 2003 — The United Nations was trying at the “highest level” yesterday to determine who was responsible for seven wide gaps in the electric fence which marks Kuwait’s border with Iraq.
UN spokesman Daljeet Bagga said the UN observers had spotted people they suspected were US troops in the demilitarized zone (DMZ) on the Kuwaiti side of the border before the holes were noticed.
He could not confirm whether they had been involved in the incidents that amount to a violation of the DMZ.
The mystery visitors, who had short haircuts, wore plainclothes and drove civilian cars and were at times accompanied by Kuwaiti border guards, who are allowed in that area.
Bagga said he had no confirmation of a Kuwaiti newspaper report that the Kuwaiti authorities were to make a number of openings in the border fence to permit the easier passage of US-led forces into Iraq in the event of war.
“We were not informed” about any decision by anyone to open the gaps, said Bagga, spokesman for the UN Iraq-Kuwait Observer Mission (UNIKOM) in Kuwait.
He said that a total of seven gaps, “big enough for tanks to pass through,” were made at various points in the Kuwaiti part of the DMZ on the 217-km (135-mile) border.
Bagga said UN officials had informed the UNIKOM headquarters in New York as well as the Kuwaiti authorities, but not spoken with the US and British forces who have massed in the emirate ready for a possible war. US military spokesmen in Kuwait referred all press queries to the Kuwaiti Information Ministry, which was unavailable for comment yesterday. UN officials were also still awaiting an official response from the Kuwaiti authorities, Bagga said.
A report in the Arab Times, quoting unnamed sources, said Kuwait was to have started making a number of openings in the border fence from Thursday. It said the locations of the openings were specified by the Kuwaiti Army in coordination with US forces deployed in the country. Security sources, who asked not to be named, said it appeared the visitors were surveying the area to determine where the fence should be cut to allow a path for military vehicles.
