VIENNA, Feb 14: Austria, a neutral country, has banned the transit of US troops or military equipment across its territory unless there is a new UN Security Council resolution authorizing a war, Defence Minister Herbert Scheibner said on Friday.

“If the United Nations gives a new mandate, we will be obliged to review our decision,” he said on Austrian state radio.

On Thursday US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld accused Austria, which in the European Union but not a NATO member, of creating problems for the movement of US troops which are being readied for a possible war.

The United States has been seeking to move troops from bases in Germany to Italy, from where they could be taken to the Gulf region, and its chosen route was by train through Austria.

US military convoys will now have to transit via two, three or four European countries or board ships in the Dutch port of Rotterdam, Rumsfeld told the Senate Armed Forces Committee.

In response, Austrian Foreign Minister Benita Ferrero-Waldner pointed out that the Austrian constitution expressly forbids the transit of foreign troops or military equipment through its territory without a UN mandate.

“If there was a new Security Council resolution authorising a military intervention in Iraq, Austria would reevaluate its position in the light of that decision,” she said.

Austria negotiated its neutral status in 1955 as part of a deal for US, French, British and Soviet troops — which had occupied the country since the end of the Second World War — to leave.

US troops were able to travel through Austria twice in the 1990s, to UN mandated missions in Bosnia and in Kosovo.

Austria’s former Social Democratic defence minister Caspar Einem responded to the US accusations by saying that “Mr Rumsfeld must have us confused with a NATO member.”

The influential Austrian daily newspaper Krone Zeitung carried the headline: “America also critical of Austria” in its Friday edition, in reference to Rumsfeld’s recent criticism of the “Old Europe” of France and Germany because of their anti-war position.—AFP