13 November 1997
PENTAGON SAYS U.N. MUST DECIDE HOW TO COMPEL IRAQI COMPLIANCE
(Bacon indicates dispute is still in diplomatic phase) (630) By Jacquelyn S. Porth USIA Security Affairs Correspondent Washington -- The Defense Department says the next phase of the diplomatic dispute between Iraq and the United Nations will be to figure out "how to compel Iraq to honor (U.N.) Security Council resolutions." "We're not talking (military) attacks, we're talking diplomacy," spokesman Ken Bacon told reporters at a November 13 news conference at the Pentagon. Iraq's actions are "an affront" to the U.N., he said, and it remains for the U.N. Security Council to decide what to do next. Council members can consider a range of options to address Iraq's serious challenge to U.N. authority, the spokesman noted. Iraq has shown its determination "to foil the entire (weapons) inspection process," he said. Although Iraq has publicly focused on excluding American weapons inspectors, he added, Iraq's underlying motivation is "to dictate to the U.N. how it does its business." Iraq has lost its public relations gambit, Bacon told a questioner, because "they have turned disunity into unity against them." Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, he said, has managed to unite the U.N. Security Council behind a new resolution and propel the council back into session to consider additional action "in response to Iraq's intransigence." Iraq has refused, he added, "to follow the norms of international behavior." Bacon reminded his audience that in the past Iraq has produced biological and chemical weapons and has used its chemical weapons in combat. The purpose of U.N. inspections and sanctions is to prevent Iraq from continuing to build those kinds of weapons, he said, as well as to "perhaps, restart its nuclear program, and to move forward with efforts that it has had in the past to construct long-range ballistic missiles, including those that could reach as far as Paris." The current dispute is not about Iraq trying to persuade the U.N. to lift sanctions against the Baghdad regime, Bacon emphasized, but rather about Iraq's efforts to build weapons of mass destruction. "Iraq could have the sanctions lifted if it met all of the terms of the U.N. resolution, including the cessation of its work" on these kinds of weapons, he explained. Iraq has "conveniently obscured that issue in all of these tirades" by Iraqi government officials, he added. All it has to do to prompt the lifting of sanctions is to comply with the U.N. mandate, the spokesman said. Expelling the American arms inspectors is further evidence that Iraq wants to continue its program of developing weapons of mass destruction, according to Bacon, and those weapons pose a threat to U.S. military personnel in the region, neighboring countries "and, maybe, countries quite far away." The United States assumes that although Iraq claims to have destroyed its biological weapons stockpile, he said, a small stockpile of agents still may remain in storage. He indicated that all but a few of the American weapons inspectors will be withdrawn from Iraq November 14. The next U.S. U-2 reconnaissance flight over Iraq is scheduled for next week. Bacon said its "mission will be flown in a way that meets the requirements" of the U.N. Special Commission. The mission, he said, will balance two factors: carrying out U.N. requirements and minimizing the pilot's risk. The spokesman reminded reporters that the U-2 aircraft was designed to fly in hostile environments and is equipped with its own electronic countermeasures. Just as the U.N. has various options it may consider as it deliberates, Bacon said, the United States, too, has a range of options available with respect to Iraq.
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