Let the UN weapons inspectors get back to work

Guardian News Service London

It is time to go back to basics on Iraq. The United States and Britain claim that Saddam Hussein's efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction since UN inspections ended in 1998, plus his pre-1998 stockpiles, represent a serious, gathering threat.

Iraq maintains it has no such weapons and has made no new efforts to acquire them. Saddam has rebuffed all attempts to resume inspections since 1998, in defiance of several UN resolutions. In return the U.S. and Britain have pursued a policy of containment, including sanctions and no-fly zones to protect persecuted Iraqis.

They now say their policy is not working. They say Iraq must be disarmed as a matter of urgency, either voluntarily or by force. While many Arab and European countries reject this approach, fearing a Middle East conflagration, they have urged Baghdad to cooperate.

Responding to this pressure, Iraq invited the UN to make an unconditional return. A detailed agreement with Iraq was finalized, to the satisfaction of Hans Blix, the chief weapons inspector, in talks in Vienna last week.

Iraq pledged to open sensitive sites such as ministries and mosques and provided unsolicited information about nuclear- related facilities. Even the infamous "presidential places" can be inspected if prior notice is given. Blix appears optimistic. He says the process investigating Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capability, and if necessary dismantling it, can begin almost immediately. The 1998 stalemate has finally been broken.

Problem solved? Crisis over? Sadly not. Far from being happy that its pressure has paid off, the U.S. says, in effect, that Blix and the UN, and France, and Russia and all those Arab states that urged Iraq to comply are being duped.

Loyal UK foreign secretary Jack Straw now says the very same inspection process whose resumption he urged as the best way of avoiding war is fatally flawed. Despite the avowed urgency of the issue, the U.S. even intends to block the inspectors' return until all of its ever lengthening list of requirements are met. This drastic course of action is justified by suspicions, based on past experience but not by current behavior, that Iraq is not acting in good faith.

Is this U.S. and British position a reasonable one? No, it is not. If the fundamental issue is disarmament, and both George Bush and Tony Blair now say it is, then the UN inspectors must be allowed to recommence their work without further delay.

If Saddam does retain WMD capability, here is the chance to find out for certain. Is it reasonable at this point to force through a draconian resolution imposing new terms that are well nigh impossible to satisfy and authorizing all-out war if they go unmet? No, it is not.

The U.S. draft amounts to a blueprint for invasion and dangerously overreaches. If the inspectors do not obtain the full cooperation Iraq has promised, they will doubtless say so soon enough.

Only if an impasse is again reached on the ground should UN enforcement measures be considered. Is it reasonable, meanwhile, to assert Iraq's complicity with al-Qaeda without offering evidence, or to step up aerial bombing that is not specifically mandated by the UN, or to jeopardize genuine disarmament because regime change is the real objective? No, it is not.

It is reasonable, however, to expect Iraq to meet all Blix's requirements. It is reasonable for the UN to demand enhanced access rights if its inspectors find they need them. And it is reasonable to hope, as a matter of back to basics common sense, that the UN security council will act carefully and unanimously and not be railroaded, split, or bypassed by a Bush administration whose judgment and good faith is also open to question.