UNITED NATIONS, Feb 4: The UN chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, on Tuesday called for more time for the inspectors to finish their job, but warned Iraq to actively cooperate with the inspectors as international community’s patience is wearing thin.

He told a press briefing at UN correspondents club that he cannot say that Baghdad was in “material breach” of UN resolution 1441. “This determination has to be made by the UN Security Council”, he said.

Mr Blix said: “Our job is to place the facts and figures before the council.”

He expressed hope that the Iraqi leadership would see that time for diplomacy is running out and it needs to come clean with its weapons programme or give evidence that it has destroyed its weapons of mass destruction.