Reuters
Baghdad - Diplomats in Iraq said on Thursday that the Iraqi leadership appeared to be showing some flexibility in an attempt to find a solution to its impasse with the United Nations over arms inspections.
The diplomats said Iraq's announcement that it would allow a team from the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to carry out routine inspections could be intended to increase pressure on the United States and Britain to find an acceptable solution to a standoff between Baghdad and the U.N. over a wider resumption of arms inspections in Iraq.
``The message that Baghdad wants to communicate to the world is that its position can be changed if it sees some signs of softening from the opposite party,'' one diplomat said. ``Baghdad is engaged in an indirect dialogue with the United Nations Security Council to find a solution acceptable by all parties to the return of U.N. weapons inspectors,'' he added.
The United States and Britain, permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, want Iraq to accept a new U.N. resolution which calls for sending arms inspectors back to the country and an easing of sanctions if Baghdad cooperates with a new disarmament agency. Baghdad has rejected the resolution adopted on December 17, 1999. Russia, France and China, also permanent members of the Security Council, abstained from voting on the resolution which was adopted by 11-0.
``Iraq has been also advised by friendly states like China, Russia and France to implement the resolution,'' another diplomat said. Wednesday, Iraq's Foreign Minister Mohammaed Saeed al-Sahaf said the resolution was ``not practical, not realistic and cannot be implemented.'' But Sahaf repeated that Iraq had complied with previous U.N. resolutions, and added: ``We want a neutral party to decide whether we abided (by previous resolutions) or not...We are not in conflict with the Security Council. Everybody knows that the Security Council is in the hands of the Americans followed by the British.''
Iraq's Foreign Ministry undersecretary Nizar Hamdoon said in remarks published Tuesday that his country would have accepted the resolution if it had been practical. Wednesday, Hamdoon said Iraq had agreed to allow a team from the IAEA to launch routine inspections to check whether Iraq possesses nuclear weapons.
The team would arrive in Iraq on January 21 and consist of four or five experts. It would be the first inspection to be carried out in Iraq since December 1998 when U.N. weapons inspectors departed Baghdad a day before Washington and London launched attacks against Iraq in mid-December 1998 for failing to cooperate with a previous arms inspection body.
The December 17 U.N. resolution sets up a new arms inspection body -- the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) -- to replace the U.N. Special Commission (UNSCOM) charged with dismantling Iraq's prohibited weapons.
