WASHINGTON, Feb 25: A day after the United States and allies proposed a UN resolution opening the way for an invasion of Iraq, US President George Bush said on Tuesday that approval was not essential and only Iraq could avert conflict by fully disarming.
Asked by reporters what it would take to avert a war, Mr Bush said: “Full disarmament.”
He said Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had failed to meet UN disarmament demands. “For the sake of peace, he must completely disarm.”
Bush spoke shortly after the chief UN weapons inspector in Iraq, Hans Blix, said Iraq had informed inspectors of the discovery of some handwritten documents dealing with the disposal of weapons of mass destruction in 1991, and of a bomb with liquid in it in an area where Baghdad was known to have disposed of biological weapons in the past.
Mr Blix said the disclosures were a new sign of Iraqi cooperation.
Although it was not clear whether Bush was aware of the report, he predicted President Saddam would try to fend off an attack by appearing to cooperate. “I suspect he will try to fool the world one more time.”
President Bush underscored the US position that it would go to war with or without new Security Council action if Iraq does not disarm. He said he hoped for approval of the resolution introduced by the United States, Britain and Spain, but added: “I don’t believe we need a second resolution.”
It remains unclear whether the United States can round up the nine votes of the 15-member Security Council needed to approve the resolution.
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters earlier that the president was confident of obtaining the needed nine votes.
But he would say only that Washington hoped France, which has argued that inspectors should be given more time, would stop short of vetoing the US-backed resolution.
IRAQI DOCUMENTS: About Iraq’s announcement on documents, Mr Blix said the disclosures were “positive” and needed to be explored further. They came in a series of six letters sent to his UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) in the past three days.
The inspectors have been charged with investigating Iraq’s claims that it has eliminated any weapons of mass destruction programmes it had.
Asked if the new disclosures were an indication of substantive cooperation, by Iraq, Blix replied, “Yes, here are some elements that are positive.”
“There is one letter in which they tell us that they have found a R-400 bomb containing liquid in a site which is known to us and (at) which they did dispose of biological weapons before,” the chief inspector said.
“There is another letter that tells us that they have found some handwritten documents concerning the act of disposal of prohibited items in 1991. Now, all these have to be followed up but these are new elements,” he said.
After denying in 1991 that it had any biological warfare programme, Iraq said in 1995 it had produced 155 R-400 bombs that were filled with biological agents, including anthrax spores. It said that during the 1991 war the bombs were buried at two locations, one along the Euphrates River.
The inspectors have been trying to get Iraq to produce documents or other evidence showing any unilateral destruction of banned weapons.—Reuters