- VIENNA (Reuters) - U.N. weapons
inspectors opened talks with Iraqi arms experts on Monday just days after
the United States proposed tough new U.N.-imposed rules for their work,
backed by the threat of military force.
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- Chief weapons inspector Hans Blix led the United Nations
team in the talks in Vienna, seen as a first test of Iraq's cooperation
since Baghdad agreed on September 16 to let the inspectors return after
a nearly four-year gap.
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- The United States has since then proposed a draft United
Nations Security Council resolution setting deadlines and tightening rules
for U.N. searches for any Iraqi nuclear, biological or chemical weapons
-- flatly rejected by Baghdad.
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- In a serious setback to its plans for getting Security
Council approval for the resolution, Washington ran into determined fresh
opposition from Russia and France.
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- Russia rapped the United States for sending its warplanes
to strike a southern Iraq target on Sunday, while France slammed the threat
of military force contained in the U.S. draft text. Both states have veto
powers in the Security Council.
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- China, which like the United States and Britain also
holds a veto given to the five permanent members in the 15-nation Security
Council, remained skeptical of the U.S. proposal.
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- Beijing repeated its wish for a political solution after
an envoy from Britain, Washington's closest ally in its Iraq campaign,
handed the draft to officials in the Chinese capital.
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- Amid the diplomatic war of words, Blix said he expected
unlimited access to sites on any return of his team to Iraq.
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- "The atmosphere is businesslike...We are moving
along nicely," said Mark Gwozdecky, a spokesman for the U.N.'s Vienna-based
International Atomic Energy Agency, after a two-and-a-half hour session.
The IAEA is hosting the talks.
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- "If the Security Council decides to issue a new
directive or resolution, of course we will follow that," he said,
when asked about the U.S. draft. "In the meantime, we have these practical
arrangements that we need to see eye-to-eye on with the Iraqis."
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- NO LIMITS TO INSPECTIONS
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- Speaking to reporters before the talks to work out details
of the U.N.'s return, which Iraq has agreed unconditionally, Blix was asked
if there would be any limitations on the sites open to inspectors.
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- "No, not that I'm aware of," he said, adding
he would report to the Security Council on Thursday.
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- The Iraqi delegation is led by President Saddam Hussein's
technical adviser General Amir al-Saadi, but an Iraqi official in Baghdad
said Iraq's sovereignty had to be respected and raised the sensitive issue
of searches at Saddam's palaces.
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- "This issue concerns respect to Iraq's sovereignty
and current talks between Iraq and the inspection teams will discuss this
issue," said Salim al-Kubaisi, head of the Arab and Foreign Relations
Committee at the Iraqi parliament.
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- U.N. inspection teams left Iraq in December 1998 on the
eve of a U.S.-British bombing raid intended to punish Baghdad for allegedly
not cooperating with the inspectors.
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- The administration of President Bush, whose policy of
"regime change" in Baghdad means toppling Saddam, has proposed
in the draft U.N. resolution that Iraq be given one week to accept demands
to disarm and 30 days to declare any weapons of mass destruction programs.
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- The draft text threatens military action if Iraq fails
to comply and France reaffirmed its opposition on Monday, warning such
an approach could threaten international stability and that "regime
change" would violate international law.
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- "We do not want to give carte blanche to military
action... That is why we cannot accept a resolution authorizing as of now
the recourse to force without (the issue) coming back to the U.N. Security
Council," Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin told Le Monde newspaper.
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- France has proposed two resolutions, with the second
one paving the way for action if Baghdad hindered the inspectors allowed
in under a first resolution.
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- AIR STRIKES
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- Russia criticized the United States and Britain on Monday
for launching air attacks on Iraq at the weekend.
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- "The surge of activity by allied aviation, which
has come at a time when representatives...prepared to go to Vienna to discuss
procedures for renewing U.N. inspections in Iraq, causes regret,"
the Foreign Ministry said.
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- "Anglo-American bombing raids in 'no-fly zones'
not only deepen the complicated atmosphere around Iraq but create obstacles
in the search for a political-diplomatic settlement of the Iraq question."
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- U.S. Undersecretary for Defense Douglas Feith responded
that the U.S. and British planes had only attacked after being fired on.
"I think that criticism is completely invalid," he told reporters
during a brief visit to Italy.
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- In a flurry of diplomacy in Turkey -- a key player in
any U.S.-led war against Baghdad -- the United States and Iraq both sought
to secure the support of the key Muslim NATO member, which publicly opposes
any such strike on its neighbor.
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- Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz said on arrival
in Ankara: "These (U.S.) threats are not only threats to Iraq but
to the whole region and especially for Turkey."
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- U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs
Elizabeth Jones said after talks in Ankara with Foreign Minister Sukru
Sina Gurel that Washington was working hard with Turkey and other countries
to agree a Security Council resolution on Iraq.
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- In Britain, Prime Minister Tony Blair faced a revolt
from rebel members of his ruling Labour Party over London's hawkish stance
on Iraq. A motion put forward by the anti-war faction at Labour's annual
conference challenged Blair "to reject armed action, and...not to
support military intervention in Iraq."
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- In Brussels, European Union foreign ministers stressed
the U.N. must be the driving force behind efforts to disarm Iraq. Several
slammed U.S. demands for a "regime change" in Baghdad.
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