League warns against attack on Iraq

The Arab League Secretary General, Mr Amr Mousa, has announced the 22-member body's opposition to any move against Iraq and warned that military intervention would threaten the stability of the Middle East.

Mr Mousa denied that Iraq had rejected the return of UN weapons inspectors, expelled in 1998. He said "the UN inspectors should return to Iraq and verify the situation" with respect to US accusations that it had rebuilt its arsenal of non-conventional weaponry. Mr Mousa said the Iraqis "are negotiating terms and seeking certain points of clarification" before agreeing to the resumption of inspections.

The Iraqi Foreign Minister, Mr Naji Sabri, said talks with the UN should also focus on lifting sanctions and ending US and British-patrolled aerial exclusion zones over northern and southern Iraq. Mr Sabri accused Washington of pressing for the return of inspectors so they could "update information about \ civilian and economic installations as well as security and military factilities".

Iraq's charge that UN arms inspectors could engage in espionage has been given substance by Mr Rolf Ekeus, the director from 1991 to 1997 of the UN Special Commission created to eliminate Iraq's non-conventional weapons. Mr Ekeus, a former Swedish diplomat, admitted that Washington had used the inspection effort "to further fundamental US interests". The UN was used as a cover for gathering information about "how Iraq's security forces were organised", its "conventional military capacity" and the movements of President Saddam Hussein, "which could be of interest if one were to target him personally".

Mr Ekeus described attempts by the US to "create crises in relations with Iraq" by putting pressure on teams to conduct "controversial inspections" with the aim of causing "a stalemate which could form the basis for direct military action". He cited an instance of calling for the inspection of the Iraqi's ministry of defence, which Baghdad considered provocative. Mr Ekeus said this was "a dangerous development for the UN, as it ran the risk of overstepping its mandate".

Meanwhile, US Defence Secretary Mr Donald Rumsfeld has said that many of Iraq's chemical, biological and nuclear arms sites are "deeply buried" and would be difficult to destroy using air power alone. "A biological laboratory can be on wheels in a trailer . . . it's movable and it looks like most any other trailer," he said.

- (Additional reporting Reuters)