UN arms inspectors searched a nuclear power facility south of Baghdad this morning.
The move came as the United States pressed for more aggressive inspections in the hunt for any Iraqi banned weapons.
Starting a second week of inspections, a team of experts swooped on al-Tuweithi compound run by Iraq's nuclear power authority in Salman Bak. Another team headed towards an undisclosed location northwest of Baghdad.
In Washington, a US official said the United States had urged chief UN inspector Mr Hans Blix to substitute his methodical approach for a more intensive multi-pronged operation that would "stress" the Iraqi system and make it harder for President Saddam Hussein to conceal his capabilities.
Mr Blix had resisted the US recommendations during a meeting at UN headquarters on Monday with US national security adviser Ms Condoleezza Rice, the official said.
On a visit to Turkey, US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said Washington was ready to invest up to hundreds of millions of dollars in air bases that might be used in a war against Baghdad.
He said Washington would start intensive talks on such investment with its NATO ally, whose Foreign Minister Yasar Yakis said yesterday Turkey would open up its bases to the US for military operations authorised by the United Nations.
Turkey's foreign ministry later said there was no final decision on opening up airbases.
The United States already uses Turkish air bases to patrol a so-called "no-fly" zone over northern Iraq that US and British planes have enforced since the end of the 1991 Gulf War. Sticking to a policy of complying with the United Nations, Iraq said yesterday it would issue a statement on its arms programmes on Saturday - a day before the UN deadline - and dismissed Washington's accusations that it possessed weapons of mass destruction.
US President George W. Bush repeated that Iraq did have banned weapons and had to disarm peacefully or face force. But a White House spokesman said guardedly US officials would take an "appropriate time" to respond to an Iraqi declaration, after studying what is likely to be a huge document in Arabic.
In new reminders that a low-intensity conflict is already being waged in the region, Iraq said it opened fire at Western warplanes and Kuwait said an Iraqi boat shot at its coastguards but there were no serious casualties.