October 3, 2002	Thursday	Rajab 25, 1423

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ISLAMABAD, Oct 2: Qaumi Jamhoori Party President Air Marshal Mohammad Asghar Khan has said that Pakistan has a responsibility, as a member of the UN Security Council, of opposing any US resolution which seeks war against Iraq.

“I expect Pakistan to join hand with the majority of the world nations that want peaceful diplomacy and not war to resolve the question of Iraqi weapons”, Asghar Khan said here in a press statement on Wednesday.

Welcoming the agreement at Vienna on Oct 1 between the United Nations and Iraq for an unconditional international inspection of Iraq’s weapon sites, he said this should help defuse the war-like situation in the Middle East.

He said most countries of the world including members of the European Union and Russia, strongly felt that the question of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction should be resolved through peaceful means and that the diplomacy should be given a fair chance.

This sane voice should be heard to avoid a fresh conflict in a region which is already ridden with high tension because of Israel’s aggression against Palestine.

Mr Khan said that peace in the Middle East depends on the attitude of the Bush administration which had raised a war cry and talked about a preemptive military action against Iraq to change the leadership in Baghdad.

He said Washington’s bellicosity largely followed the address to the UN General Assembly of President George W. Bush on Sept 12 and the subsequent “Bush doctrine” that seeks to destroy Iraq and inflict more miseries on its people. One aspect of the belligerence of President Bush was reflective of his domestic political agenda. This seemed to be a major requirement in a situation where main US political organizations could not afford to annoy powerful Jewish lobby which had traditionally been the largest patron of election campaigns in the United States.

The QJP president said if the US administration failed to heed the majority world opinion and pressures the United Nations for a new resolution for an action against Iraq would be unjustified in the wake of Baghdad’s readiness to allow unconditional inspection of its strategic sites.

Asghar Khan said the silence of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Conference over this sensitive issue which was bound to endanger the world peace, was highly regrettable and deserved to be condemned.

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