WASHINGTON, Oct 13: The United States dismissed the latest Iraqi offer on weapons inspections as “word games” and repeated its call for sustained international pressure on Iraq to disarm.

Iraq appeared on Saturday to relent on some UN demands on weapons inspections after ignoring a list of ground rules United Nations officials sent to Baghdad earlier.

But diplomats said a new letter from an Iraqi presidential adviser delivered to weapons inspectors, the second this week, still fell short of a total acceptance of conditions for future inspections set down by UN disarmament officials.

“Iraq continues to want to play word games and not comply,” State Department spokeswoman Jo-Anne Prokopowicz said. “It will continue to make contradictory promises and then choose the version of most tactical benefit at any given moment.

“Iraq responds to pressure, but will revert to non-compliance the moment it thinks it can. That is why the UN Security Council must tell Iraq what to do and what will happen if it doesn’t,” she added.

The Security Council opens debate on Wednesday on a resolution that would threaten Iraq if its defiance of UN weapons inspectors continues. The United States has drafted a measure that would give inspectors more rights and authorise the use of force if Iraq did not comply.

Iraq appeared on Saturday to relent on some UN demands when an adviser to President Saddam Hussein sent a letter saying Iraq was ready to remove all obstacles to a return of inspectors after a nearly four-year break.

“We assert our complete readiness once again to receive the advance team on October 19 as per our preliminary agreement with you and our readiness to resolve all issues that may block the road to our joint cooperation,” wrote Gen. Amir al-Saadi.

IMPORTANT LETTER: The new letter to chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency, acknowledged their desire for “unfettered access” to eight controversial palace sites of Saddam’s, but made no specific concession on the issue.

Al-Saadi had written a letter to the two UN officials on Thursday, pledging his cooperation but ignoring their demands, ranging from interviews of Iraqi scientists outside of their country to flying U-2 satellite spy planes.

The latest letter did suggest a new flexibility on allowing inspectors to interview Iraqis and to make flights over Iraqi territory.

A Western UN Security Council diplomat said Iraq was still avoiding a “yes” or “no” reply to the inspectors.

“It sounds like they recognise they had shot themselves in the foot with the first letter but this one still leaves loose ends,” the envoy said in New York.

In Baghdad, some 500 Iraqi Muslim clerics and scholars issued an edict urging Muslims everywhere to launch a holy war to “burn the earth under the feet” of the United States if it attacked.

“If, God forbid, the aggression takes place, declaring jihad against the evil American administration is the duty of every able Muslim,” their edict or fatwa said.

SHOW OF SUPPORT: The Iraqi government put the final touches on Sunday to preparations for a presidential referendum designed to show massive domestic support for Saddam.

It wants Tuesday’s tightly controlled vote to show that Iraqi people stand firmly behind the Iraqi strongman. Saddam, 65, is the only candidate. The result is not in doubt — official results showed he won 99.96 percent of a first referendum in 1995.

After winning congressional authorisation backing the possible use of force to rid Iraq of suspected weapons of mass destruction and possibly oust Saddam, Bush said in his weekly radio address on Saturday that “America is speaking with one voice”.

“Iraq must disarm and comply with all existing UN resolutions, or it will be forced to comply,” Bush said.

The United States now takes its case to the United Nations, where many states want a compromise likely to delay any outbreak of war.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said most UN members preferred a French proposal for two resolutions: one to first establish tougher inspection conditions and a second that would approve the use of force if these conditions were not met.

The United States wants a single resolution demanding that Iraq give inspectors “unfettered access,” and granting Washington the right to decide when and if Iraq has violated the inspection regime and to attack without further authorisation.

Annan was due to arrive on Sunday in China, a veto-wielding permanent member of the UN Security Council, as talk of compromise on action against Iraq gathered steam.

The United Nations sent arms experts to Iraq to destroy its weapons of mass destruction after US-led forces drove Iraqi troops from Kuwait in the 1991 Gulf War. The inspectors left in 1998 before a US-British air assault to punish Baghdad for not cooperating with the UN experts.—Reuters