ACCESSION NUMBER:00000
FILE ID:95101304.POL
DATE:10/13/95
TITLE:13-10-95 U.N. CONSIDERS TIGHTENING WATCH ON IRAQI WEAPONS PROGRAMS
TEXT:
(UNSCOM six-month report says Iraq hid major programs) (940)
By Judy Aita
USIA United Nations Correspondent
United Nations -- Members of the U.N. Security Council said October 13
that new revelations about Iraq's weapons programs have scuttled any
talk of lifting sanctions, especially the oil embargo, against Baghdad
in the foreseeable future and will require adjustments in the U.N.'s
long-term monitoring plans.
Ambassador Rolf Ekeus, chairman of the U.N. Special Commission
overseeing the destruction of Iraq's chemical, biological, nuclear,
and ballistic missile programs (UNSCOM), told the council that new
information gathered in the past six months shows that Iraq had kept
secret a major biological weapons program and its ability to produce
indigenous SCUD-type missiles.
He met with the council to discuss the written report of UNSCOM's
activities for the past six months, which was given to council members
earlier in the week. The report spells out the details of the
discoveries that had been revealed piecemeal since April in what has
been described as the one of the "most significant periods" of work
since the commission was founded at the end of the Persian Gulf war in
1991.
Much of the recently gathered information contradicts earlier
declarations by Iraq and requires UNSCOM assessments to be revised,
according to the report.
U.S. Ambassador Madeleine Albright said that "by all indications (the
report) shows that Iraq has cheated and lied in terms of its dealings
with the United Nations and the international community."
Iraq admitted to UNSCOM that in the summer of 1991 orders were issued
by a "high authority" to directors of the weapons sites to "protect
important documents" by packing them quickly and delivering them on
demand to special security agents. "Iraq's original claim that all
documentation was destroyed is thus patently false," the report
states.
UNSCOM doubts that the material turned over in August represents all
of the documents. "Much more documentation must still exist,
particularly in certain significant areas such as production records,
Iraq's procurement networks, and sources of supply," according to the
report.
At a press conference after his private meeting with the council,
Ekeus said that his report is "disturbing in the sense that it
indicates that Iraq has not...been cooperating in the spirit or
according to the letter of 667 and other relevant resolutions.
"Iraq has kept secret a major weapons program which was
conceptualized, developed, and put into effect before the Gulf War:
the large-scale production of a biological warfare agent. Also highly
significant is that (the agent) was put into delivery systems -- bombs
and warheads for long-range missiles; furthermore they were deployed
for use at various launching points."
Iraq also produced SCUD-type engines, put them into some missiles, and
successfully completed test flights, he said, noting, "That means that
in addition to imports from the (former) Soviet Union it has managed
to independently augment its capability. That has created some serious
problems in regard to counting" the number of missiles actually
destroyed and assuring the international community that Iraq is
complying with the U.N. resolutions.
"We now know Iraq had chemical...and biological warheads. That means
(Iraq had) strategic capabilities of considerable significance. The
matter of warheads, mobile launchers, the matter of mobile missiles
are a matter of increased risk and problems," Ekeus said.
Ekeus said UNSCOM has other problems as well: verifying that Iraq
actually destroyed the biological agents and weapons it said it did in
1991, determining if there are SCUD-type missiles that have not been
destroyed, accounting for the huge amounts of precursor chemicals for
a very potent nerve agent, and verifying if there are any chemical and
biological warheads remaining.
"We are not satisfied. We have to investigate. We have concerns
because there were bombs filled with such agents. Iraq has aircraft to
deliver such bombs. We know if there are missile warheads left in
Iraq, Iraq has been seriously misleading us," Ekeus said.
Both Security Council members and U.N. officials are concerned because
while Iraq turned over about one million pages of documents in August,
its actions came not from a change in policy but because of the
defection of General Hussein Kamel Hassan, the head of Iraq's weapons
programs. Iraq has blamed Kamel Hassan for withholding the information
from the U.N. for four and a half years.
The report shows essentially how far away Iraq is from cooperating
with the United Nations, diplomats said. Essentially what UNSCOM
learned came about because of a defection which could not be
anticipated. It casts even greater doubt about how much UNSCOM really
knows about Iraq's activities and suggests that the current U.N.
monitoring system needs to be tightened, the number of monitored sites
increased, and new equipment added.
Ekeus, while agreeing that the monitoring and verification system will
need to be adjusted to accommodate programs that were larger than
previously thought, pointed out that the system is working and is
"very robust and sound."
It detected the purchase of large amounts of "growth medium" that
pointed to Iraq's large biological weapons program, thereby eventually
compelling Iraq to release documents showing just how advanced the
program was, he said. The monitoring program also detected Iraq's
movement of equipment that could be converted to chemical weapons
production.
Before the oil embargo can be lifted, Albright said, "we have to make
sure that the monitoring system which has been described positively in
the past by chairman Ekeus is now adjusted, upgraded in order to be
able to deal with the new situation."
NNNN
|
NEWSLETTER
|
|
Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list
|
|
|
