April 16, 2000
Baghdad - Iraq on Saturday rejected the latest U.N. plans to resume weapons inspections in the country, saying a proposal for the new arms body UNMOVIC "means nothing to us." Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz said Baghdad had given no indication it would cooperate with inspections or accept December's Security Council Resolution 1284 offering a renewable suspension of sanctions in exchange for cooperation.
"What has been decided by the Security Council concerning the commission that has been formed means nothing to us," he told reporters following the council's unanimous approval on Thursday for the UNMOVIC blueprint. "I have never hinted that Iraq will cooperate with this resolution. I said clearly in my speech this morning that Resolution 1284 is a ruse, is unjust and we cannot accept it," Aziz told reporters after a talk he gave to Iraqi expatriates. Aziz, addressing the expatriates earlier, said: "This attempt by the United States and Britain to impose on Iraq a new and iniquitous resolution will never succeed, despite their attempts to falsify the truth and hide their acts which contravene international law and human rights."
The Security Council approved plans for the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) to replace the U.N. Special Commission for Disarmament in Iraq (UNSCOM), which left Baghdad in December 1998. UNSCOM, which left Baghdad on the eve of U.S.-British air strikes, was accused by Baghdad of spying on behalf of the United States and Israel.
Aziz also repeated a call for the total lifting of sanctions imposed on Iraq after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait that led to the Gulf War. "Any resolution that does not satisfy Iraq by lifting the embargo and condemning aggression carries no value," the veteran diplomat said. "The leaders of the United States and Britain are aggressors who are attacking your country and killing its children with premeditation, urged on by imperialist and Zionist hatred," he told the expatriates.
Hans Blix, UNMOVIC's chief disarmament inspector and former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, presented the Security Council with procedures to ensure the independence of the new commission's members and avoid accusations of espionage like those Iraq levelled against UNSCOM. The plan leaves UNMOVIC's door open to former UNSCOM members.
The Blix plan plays up the importance of confidentiality and stresses the need to carry out inspections "in a correct, technically competent and thorough manner." It also separates the inspection and analysis parts of UNMOVIC's work, as well as setting up a special unit for information from intelligence services and imposes strict limits on access.
Once the operation procedures were approved, France, Russia and China were expected to try to use their clout with Baghdad to try to persuade it to allow U.N. arms inspectors back in. Both U.S. and Russian ambassadors at the United Nations were positive about the plan.
Richard Holbrooke said Washington fully endorsed it, while Serguei Lavrov described the vote as "a step in the right direction" but predicted a return of U.N. weapons inspectors would not happen until U.S.-British bombing raids were stopped. "If the unilateral actions continue, then I don't believe the atmosphere would be right for any hope for success," Lavrov said.
