Nato doves refuse to budge but US hawks sharpen claws

WASHINGTON - Diplomatic efforts have failed to heal a transatlantic rift over the Iraq crisis.

Key European allies yesterday rejected a Nato compromise to bolster Turkish defences and Washington and Berlin disagreed over whether Iraq and Osama bin Laden had formed what the White House called an "unholy partnership".

The United States, which is threatening to attack Iraq if it fails to destroy its alleged weapons of mass destruction, moved ahead with its war planning despite opposition from its European allies, calling up nearly 39,000 additional reserve troops. The US now has more than 150,000 Reserve and National Guard forces on duty, the largest number since the last Gulf War.

The developments came as missile experts consulted by UN arms inspectors determined that Iraq possesses a missile system that violates UN resolutions. The experts found the Al Samoud 2 missile has a range greater than that allowed and recommended the engines be destroyed.

This is ahead of Saturday's Security Council meeting at which chief UN inspectors Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei are to report back. Amid US efforts to push ahead with war planning, France, Germany and Belgium shot down a compromise aimed at breaking Nato's deadlock over plans to protect Turkey in case of a US-led war.

The European trio, fierce critics of any rush to military action, refused to budge at least until after Blix and ElBaradei report.

Nato has been debating plans to deploy Patriot air-defence missiles, early-warning planes and special anti-chemical and germ warfare teams to Turkey, which shares a frontier with Iraq and is a likely launchpad for any US attack.

But France, Germany and Belgium argue that starting defence planning now would lock Nato into a "logic of war", implicitly accepting that an armed conflict against Iraq is inevitable.

A public disagreement also flared between Germany and the US over whether a purported bin Laden audiotape broadcast on Wednesday was proof of what White House spokesman Ari Fleischer described as an "unholy partnership" between Iraq and bin Laden's al Qaeda network.

The US blames the elusive bin Laden for the attacks that killed more than 3000 people on September 11, 2001.

The tape urged Iraqis to repel any US-led invasion and said any Arab ruler who supported the US effort was an "apostate whose blood should be spilled".

Fleischer said bin Laden's reference in the tape to "our mujahideen brothers" inside Iraq and his appeal to Muslims to prepare for jihad suggested a "strong statement of alliance" between Iraq and al Qaeda.

The US has said one of the main reasons for disarming Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, by force if necessary, was the possibility that Baghdad would provide terror groups with biological, chemical or nuclear weapons.

But Germany rejected the US assertion that the bin Laden tape proved an alliance with Iraq. "From what is known so far we don't think we can conclude that there is evidence of an axis or close link between the regime in Baghdad and al Qaeda," said Government spokesman Thomas Steg.

Baghdad, which rejects allegations it is concealing weapons of mass destruction, has repeatedly denied any connection to al Qaeda.

Iraqi Vice-President Taha Yassin Ramadan said: "America is working on dragging the world toward a great catastrophe by insisting on launching an unjust aggression on Iraq."

Secretary of State Colin Powell told Congress yesterday that the US was still discussing asylum for Saddam with a number of nations.

"We are in touch with a number of countries that have expressed an interest in conveying this message to the Iraqi regime that time's up and one way to avoid a lot of suffering is for the regime to step down.

- REUTERS


Herald feature: Iraq