All eyes on Blix ahead of crucial report

8.00pm

UNITED NATIONS - Top UN arms inspectors are likely to tell the Security Council early tomorrow morning (NZ time) that Iraq has not fully cooperated with disarmament demands but refrain from saying it has failed to comply as the United States wants, diplomats say.

The language used by chief inspector Hans Blix and his colleague in charge of nuclear arms, Mohamed ElBaradei, will be key in determining if wavering council members call for more inspections or back US-British plans for possible war.

"We're expecting a mixed bag," said a senior official in the administration of US President George W. Bush.

A Security Council diplomat told reporters the crucial question was no longer whether Iraq was cooperating.

"The question is whether there is continued value to the inspections or whether inspections are for the birds against the criterion of complete disarmament of weapons of mass destruction," said the envoy who did not want to be identified.

ElBaradei told Reuters on Thursday he believed inspections should continue for a few more months providing Iraq cooperates. Blix, responsible for Iraq's chemical, biological and missile programs, has refrained from giving any time estimate.

"Iraq still has a chance to exonerate itself but time is critical," said ElBaradei, head of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency. "They can't afford but to have 100 percent cooperation."

At issue is whether the United States and Britain can follow up Friday's meeting with a resolution that would explicitly or implicitly authorise war. Britain is anxious to give any military force international legitimacy.

So far Russia, China and France, who have veto power on the 15-member council, as well as Germany, Syria and other members want to beef up inspections, triple the number of arms experts and send in UN security guards to "freeze" suspected sites.

Their reaction to the inspectors' reports will be immediate as the opposing sides confront each other in the televised 1515 GMT session with the French, German, Russia, Chinese and Syrian foreign ministers attending along with US Secretary of State Colin Powell. Chile, Mexico and Spain are also sending foreign ministers.

RUSSIA OPPOSSES RESOLUTION

The United States and Britain hope to get the minimum nine positive votes required for adoption of a resolution and possibly risk a veto. France is conducting a similar lobbying effort in hopes a US move towards war will not get the minimum votes and spare it a veto.

A resolution could be circulated as early as this weekend but most diplomats believe next week is more likely.

Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said after arriving in New York on Thursday night that Russia is opposed to a new resolution on Iraq and that the world body needed to be united in any action it decided to take against Iraq.

He said a peaceful solution was still the best option.

"I believe there is no need at present in passing a second, a third or a fourth resolution on Iraq," Ivanov said in comments carried by the Itar-Tass news agency.

"Ahead of us there are problems the solution of which will be...difficult," Ivanov said, adding the world community "should not split, but unite".

Much depends on what Blix says, with UN officials saying he will have many grey shades and speak about areas where Iraq has cooperated as well as where it did not.

On the latest controversy over long-range missiles, Blix may well say that while it appears Iraq is in violation of Security Council resolutions, he will give Baghdad a chance to respond before taking any steps to destroy the hardware.

A panel of six independent experts he organised this week determined that Iraq's Al Samoud 2 missile project is illegal because its range exceeds the 93-mile (150 km) limit first set down in a 1991 Security Council resolution.

Blix and ElBaradei also report on their trip to Baghdad last weekend at which they won concessions from Iraq on private interviews with Iraqi scientists, the use of a U-2 spy planes and legislation banning weapons of mass destruction.

Iraq set some conditions on the U-2 overflights but UN officials said Blix would consider them as suggestions only. On the interviews, few have been held without minders and some included tape recorders taken in by the scientists.

Both Washington and London seized on a UN finding that Iraq has missiles of prohibited range to bolster their case that Iraq is harbouring banned weapons.

"The decision is this for the United Nations: When you say something, does it mean anything? You've got to decide," Bush told thousands of sailors gathered at a Florida naval base in a display of military might.

Yet NATO, facing one of its gravest crises in its 54-year history, called off a meeting of ambassadors after it became clear they were no nearer to agreeing whether the alliance should help Turkey, Iraq's neighbour, with war preparations.

- REUTERS


Herald feature: Iraq