WARSAW, Oct 4: Poland said on Saturday it regretted an earlier allegation that its troops in Iraq had found several Franco-German missiles made this year, after a strong rebuke from French President Jacques Chirac.

Polish Defence Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski said he “deplored the indications concerning the date the missiles were produced”, and promised an immediate and thorough investigation into the matter, but did not specifically deny the find.

“All information from the ministry spokesman concerning the seizure of Roland (short-range surface-to-air) missiles, as well as the information by the media relative to this affair were neither approved by the ministry nor by the chief of staff of the Polish military,” he said in a statement.

French President Jacques Chirac brushed off earlier allegations by the Polish defence ministry that its troops had discovered four Roland surface-to-air missiles made this year, saying that the missiles had not been built for 15 years.

“There cannot be any missiles there in 2003 because the missiles haven’t been built for the past 15 years,” Mr Chirac said at the EU summit in Rome.

Iraqi police notified the Polish troops of the missiles, and “on Oct 1, we seized four Roland missiles bearing French markings, made in 2003, in a house near Al Hillah”, south of Baghdad, defence ministry spokesman Eugeniusz Mleczak said.

Mr Chirac said Polish soldiers must “have been confused” about the find, which would have violated a UN weapons embargo against Iraq, and should have checked their find more carefully before making the allegations.

He had a “friendly but firm” talk with Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller, attending the EU summit, he added.

In Paris the French foreign ministry also denied the allegations by the Polish defence ministry, saying they were based upon “erroneous information”.

Paris had not “authorized the supply, including spare parts (of weapons material) to Iraq after July 1990”, once international sanctions were slapped on Baghdad after its invasion of Kuwait, a spokesman said.—AFP