ACCESSION NUMBER:350294
FILE ID:POL406
DATE:06/23/94
TITLE:UNITED NATIONS REPORT, THURSDAY, JUNE 23 (06/23/94)
TEXT:*94062306.POL
UNITED NATIONS REPORT, THURSDAY, JUNE 23
(Iraq/chemical, Korea) (610)
1.N. SAYS ALL IRAQI CHEMICAL WEAPONS DESTROYED
The U.N. Special Commission overseeing the destruction of Iraqi weapons
(UNSCOM) has announced that all of Iraq's chemical weapons have been
destroyed.
The two-year operation, which involved some 100 experts from 23 countries,
fulfilled the Security Council's orders to eliminate Iraq's declared
chemical weapons stockpiles and did so "expeditiously, at minimal expense,
and with no damage to the environment," according to a June 22 UNSCOM
announcement.
Destroyed were "over 480,000 liters of chemical warfare agents (including
mustard agent and the nerve agents sarin and tabun); over 28,000 chemical
munitions (involving eight types of munitions ranging from rockets to
artillery shells to bombs and ballistic missile warheads); and...over
1,040,000 kilograms and 648 barrels of some 45 different precursor
chemicals for the production of chemical warfare agents," UNSCOM said.
The commission sent two inspection teams to Iraq May 31-June 14 to make a
final assessment of the destruction operations that were set up at Al
Muthanna, a former Iraqi chemical weapons site. The inspectors were to
confirm that all the chemical warfare agents, their precursors, and certain
production equipment were completely destroyed and the site left in a safe
and acceptable condition, the announcement said.
The teams said that at the destruction sites "no significant level of
chemical contamination could be detected and that all destruction
activities at Al Muthana were complete."
The "hand-over protocols" were signed at a formal meeting between UNSCOM and
Iraq in Baghdad on June 13.
UNSCOM said that while its chemical destruction group has been disbanded, it
will continue to visit the Al Muthana site as part of the long-term
monitoring and verification activities required by the Security Council's
cease-fire demands.
NORTH KOREAN SANCTION TALKS LOW KEY, U.S. SAYS
U.S. Ambassador Madeleine Albright said June 23 that she will continue to
discuss the details of a North Korean sanctions resolution with fellow
Security Council members "in a very low-key manner."
Albright said that during a closed council meeting she was going to inform
the council of the recent positive developments since former President
Jimmy Carter visited North Korea last week.
"President Clinton said yesterday that he views the developments positively
and that some of the guarantees the North Koreans had given in terms of
freezing their program allowed us to move forward," the ambassador told
journalists outside the meeting room.
The president said June 22 that he was satisfied that North Korea was
willing to temporarily freeze its nuclear program and that the U.S. would
open comprehensive talks in Geneva in July.
Nevertheless, Albright said that the U.S. delegation at the U.N. is "going
to continue consultations on a resolution in a very low-key manner."
"When the talks begin -- at that stage -- we will be prepared to suspend the
sanctions resolution discussions," Albright said.
The ambassador has been discussing a five-point sanctions resolution aimed
at diplomatically isolating North Korea in order to convince Pyongyang to
open its nuclear program to international inspections.
The sanctions included stopping all technical and scientific cooperation
1hat could advance North Korea's nuclear knowledge; ending all U.N.
economic assistance; reducing the size of North Korea's diplomatic
missions; curtailing technical, commercial, and educational exchanges; and
a mandatory arms embargo.
When she announced the details of the resolution June 15 Albright had said
that "we do not see sanctions as an end in themselves but as a tool whereby
the international community shows to the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic
of Korea) it needs an adjustment" in its behavior.
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