Blair fetches the stick for Bush to beat Iraq By Sanjay Suri
LONDON - The long-awaited British government dossier on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's weapons capability produces little hard evidence of Saddam's access to nuclear weapons. It says only that he can use chemical and biological weapons at 45 minutes notice and can develop nuclear weapons within one or two years "if Iraq obtained fissile material and other essential components from foreign sources". But that is not the importance of the dossier's release. The 55-page report is, in fact, less an intelligence assessment that seeks to describe than it is a political manifesto that seeks to persuade. As such, it includes photos of Iranian soldiers killed in the war with Iraq and civilian Kurds killed by chemical weapons in Halabja in 1988. It lists weapons that UN inspectors failed to find during inspections in the early 1990s. Most importantly, the dossier seeks to shift the burden of proof back onto Iraq to show that it, in fact, does not have any such weapons. While Iraq claims that all biological weapons and agents have been destroyed, the dossier says that "no convincing proof of any kind has been produced to support this claim". In that larger sense, therefore, the release of the document is a clear signal of an impending collision between Iraq and the US. Iraq immediately sought to defuse the crisis with a declaration following publication of the dossier that United Nations inspectors will have "unfettered access" to all Iraqi sites listed in the British dossier. But the 55-page dossier makes a clear case that UN inspections will no longer be good enough. Saddam has "identified possible weak points in the inspections process and knows how to exploit them", the dossier says. "Sensitive equipment and papers are already being concealed." Iraq signaled immediate readiness to open the listed sites to inspection. Presidential adviser Amer Saadi said following publication of the dossier that "inspectors will have unfettered access" after practical arrangements are made for their visit likely next month but only "if there is no interference from outside parties". Saadi said, "His [Blair's] allegations are long, his evidence is short." The report, he said, is a "hodgepodge of half-truths, lies and short-sighted and naive allegations". But the British dossier follows the US line closely in distancing possible action from an acceptance of UN inspections. "The history of UN weapons inspections was characterized by persistent obstruction," the dossier says. The dossier says that "Iraq has admitted to UNSCOM [United Nations Special Commission] to having a large, effective system for hiding proscribed material including documentation, components, production equipment and possibly biological and chemical agents and weapons from the UN". Iraqis had in the past resorted to physical threats and psychological intimidation of inspectors, the dossier says. In the face of these allegations, the new Iraqi offer of access to UN inspectors will not be good enough, analysts say. The dossier speaks of alternative sites for weapons, and also of an alternative leadership to Saddam Hussein. The dossier says Saddam would have the final word on use of chemical and biological weapons, but suggests that authority to use these weapons "could have delegated to his son Qusai". The dossier has been prepared on the basis of the work of Britain's Joint Intelligence comprising the Secret Intelligence Service, Government Communications Headquarters, the Security Service and the Defense Intelligence Staff. It is "unprecedented for the government to publish this kind of document", Prime Minister Tony Blair wrote in a foreword to the report. Blair said, "I am in no doubt that the threat is serious and current, that he has made progress on weapons of mass destruction, and that he has to be stopped." To ignore the threat "would be to place at risk the property and lives of our own people", he says. "We must ensure that he does not get to use the weapons he has, or get hold of the weapons he wants." The report contains several assertions about Saddam Hussein's program but offers little detail other than satellite pictures of facilities alleged to be used for manufacture of chemical and biological weapons. "We cannot publish everything we know," Blair says. The report suggests that there is a lot of specific material that cannot be revealed. "Intelligence rarely offers a complete account of activities which are designed to remain concealed," the dossier says. "Intelligence sources need to be protected and this limits the detail that can be made available." In one of few details offered, the dossier names an Indian firm as supplying equipment that could be used by Iraq to launch nuclear and chemical strikes. The dossier says, "A new plant at al-Mamoun for indigenously producing ammonium perchlorate, which is a key component in the production of solid propellant rocket motors has also been constructed. This has been provided illicitly by NEC Engineers Private Limited, an Indian chemical engineering firm with extensive links in Iraq." The British government report says that this Indian company has also been supplying to "other suspect facilities such as the Fallujah 2 chlorine plant". Rajiv Dhir, the general manager of NEC Engineers, was arrested by Indian authorities in June and charged with violation of India's export controls. Dhir faces seven years' imprisonment if convicted. Navdeep Suri, spokesman for the Indian High Commission, confirmed that the company's export license had been revoked and stated that "such actions are in violation of India's export control laws and whenever such a violation comes to the government's attention, firm action is taken". Although the dossier notes that "other [Indian] individuals and companies are still illicitly procuring for Iraq", Suri declined to comment on what he characterized as these "speculative statements". In an interview with London's Guardian newspaper, C P Ahuja, current NEC Engineers manager, said that the dossier's allegations against his firm were "absolutely wrong". While Ahuja admitted that the firm did business in Iraq, he said it did so "under UN auspices". "We are just an engineering company," he said on Tuesday. "We don't make chemicals." The dossier says that Iraq currently lacks the equipment to make a nuclear bomb. "Iraq needs certain key equipment, including gas centrifuge components and components for the production of fissile material before a nuclear bomb could be developed." But it says Saddam is "almost certainly seeking an indigenous ability to enrich uranium to the level needed for a nuclear weapon". The dossier says that Saddam has "sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa, despite having no active civil nuclear power program that could require it". Iraq, it says, also has been looking for vacuum pumps, magnet production lines, anhydrous hydrogen fluoride and fluorine gas and 60,000 aluminum tubes - all components needed to build nuclear weapons. The dossier alleges that after the Gulf War in 1991, Saddam refurbished his weapons sites to manufacture chemical and biological weapons, and still possesses the bombs, shells, artillery rockets and ballistic missiles he would need to deliver them. Saddam has them and is prepared to conceal them from inspections and, in the end, to use them, the dossier says. Biological weapons are being developed in mobile laboratories, the report says. It names a woman, Dr Rihab Taha, as a leading figure in Iraq's biological weapons program. The dossier says Iraq has "illegally obtained up to 20 al-Hussein missiles with a range of 650 kilometers". These can carry chemical or biological warheads, the report says. Saddam is also deploying al-Samoud liquid propellant missiles with a range up to 200 kilometers, instead of the 150 kilometer limit set by the UNSCOM team. The report says that Iraq has constructed an engine stand to test missiles that could reach British bases in Cyprus, Greece and Turkey, all of the Gulf region and Israel. All these programs have been funded by an income of US$3 billion earned last year outside UN control. Iraq also has huge quantities of mustard gas, and of the nerve agents tabun, sarin and VX, according to the report. These are being produced at new facilities at Salman Pak and are supported by storage and precursor facilities known as Fallujah 1, 2 and 3. Saddam "continues to attach great importance to the possession of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles which he regards as being the basis for Iraq's regional power". The dossier adds that "new chemical facilities have been built, some with illegal foreign assistance, and are probably fully operational or ready for production". These are said to include Ibn Sina company at Tarmiyah, headed by Hikmat Na'im al-Jalu and a facility at Al Qa'Qa. Other facilities of concern listed are the castor oil production plant at Fallujah, al-Dawrah foot and mouth disease vaccine institute, and a vaccine plant at Abu Ghraib. (Inter Press Service) http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/DI26Ak01.html Serbian News Network - SNN [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.antic.org/
