UN starts destroying Iraqi mustard gas

10.00am

BAGHDAD - UN experts searching Iraq for banned weapons began on Wednesday to destroy mustard gas and artillery shells left over from an arms search more than four years ago.

Assisted by an Iraqi team, a UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) chemical team began destroying ten 155mm artillery shells and four containers filled with mustard gas at Al Mutanna, 140km north of Baghdad.

Hiro Ueki, spokesman for the inspectors, said it would take four to five days to complete the process.

The shells and mustard gas were due to be destroyed in 1998 when the previous team of weapons inspectors departed. The search resumed in November after a four-year break.

UNMOVIC had not destroyed any prohibited material since.

Journalists who followed the inspectors said a barrel of fuel near the banned munitions exploded and burned in an apparent accident. No one was hurt, they said.

UNMOVIC experts sought a private interview with a senior Iraqi biological scientist on Wednesday, but the questioning did not proceed after the scientist rejected UNMOVIC's terms, Ueki said.

But nuclear inspectors did hold a private interview with a scientist connected to Iraq's former centrifuge programme, he said without giving any further details.

Under intense pressure from chief inspectors, Iraq last week allowed its scientists to be questioned without the presence of an Iraqi minder.

Chief arms inspectors Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei report on Friday to the UN Security Council. A critical report could quicken a countdown to a US-led invasion to disarm Iraq by force.

Baghdad says it is cooperating fully with the inspectors and insists it has no banned weapons.

Another UNMOVIC chemical team inspected Al Qadissiya and Al Mahmoudiyah water treatment plants.

An UNMOVIC missile team inspected the Jaber Bin Hayan State Company that produces missile seals and gaskets.

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors conducted a car-borne radiation survey and deployed an air sampler at a facility some 30km north of Baghdad.

A second IAEA team deployed another air sampler and performed an inspection at a facility about 60km west of Baghdad.

IAEA inspectors also met a senior Foreign Ministry diplomat, Ueki said without elaborating.

The Foreign Ministry said in a statement the diplomat was a former ambassador whom the inspectors wanted to interview regarding a US allegation that Baghdad had imported uranium from Niger in 1998.

It said the retired diplomat had to return from Jordan to under go the questioning. It said the interview lasted 90 minutes, without giving details.

Herald feature: Iraq