Catch twenty-two
Co-operating with weapons inspectors may not be enough to save Iraq from American military action, reports Dina Ezzat
International arms inspectors went back to work yesterday in Iraq after a four year hiatus. The success or failure of their mission, in theory at least, will determine whether or not the US has a pretext to launch its planned military action against Iraq.
According to resolution 1441, unanimously adopted on 8 November by the 15 UN Security Council members, if the inspectors report back to the Security Council that Iraq is in material breach of the inspection terms as set out in the resolution, then it faces grave consequences.
"So it is war that we are still facing. And we still think it is inevitable," commented one Iraqi diplomatic source. And though consultations between Iraqi officials and Hans Blix, the chief inspector of the UN Verification, Monitoring and Inspection Committee, and Mohamed El-Barad'i, director- general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, indicate, says the source, that they are coming to Iraq to work "in good faith", they also suggest that both have come under intense pressure from the Americans. Neither is willing to say anything that might offend Washington. "And this is part of the problem. Blix and El-Barad'i may be decent people but they are not the masters of the operation. They themselves do not claim otherwise."
Both have promised to conduct inspections with the highest levels of professionalism and have asked the Iraqi government to co-operate to the maximum. Both have been using every contact they have to encourage the Iraqi government to avoid being, or even appearing to be, in any material breach of 1441 which demands Iraq fully facilitate the inspectors' mission.
In Cairo this week El-Barad'i had meetings with President Hosni Mubarak, Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher, and Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, requesting every diplomatic effort be made to encourage Iraq to show as much flexibility as possible and desist from any actions or statements that might be interpreted by the US-dominated UN Security Council as material breach.
But as far as the Iraqi government is concerned Blix and El-Barad'i are the least of their worries. Baghdad is far more concerned by those inspectors, particularly the Americans, who keep in close touch with intelligence and military bodies, particularly the Pentagon and Mossad.
"We have had inspectors spying on us before and we have no guarantee that this will not be the case again. Actually we would be foolish to think that this will not be the case," the Iraqi diplomat said.
In a joint press conference held in Cairo on Monday with Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa El- Barad'i, while he could not guarantee unequivocally that none of the inspectors will be involved in spying, did say that "anybody caught spying will be excluded from the inspection team."
For the Iraqi official this is "a joke".
"Some people could be in Iraq for very short term periods, do whatever spying they have to do and go. And then nobody will be in a situation to fire anybody," complained the Iraqi source.
Compounding Iraqi concerns is the fact that the American administration has appointed an American intelligence officer in charge of monitoring the flow of information going in and coming out of the inspectors' note books. "So whatever the chief inspectors say about the fact that they are governed by the Security Council we know who is really in charge," the source said.
The ambiguous definition of what might constitute a material breach is also causing concern in Baghdad. Technically, if Iraqi officials deny inspectors access to any site, that is a material breach. But would the Iraqis be considered in material breach if the guard at the gate of any given site took a few minutes to allow inspectors in?
Blix and El-Barad'i have been emphatic in stating that it is the Security Council and not the inspectors who will decide whether or not Iraq is in material breach. And given Washington's domination of the Council it is unlikely to be too difficult for the Americans to claim that Iraq is in material breach.
"We accepted the return of the inspectors in September and finalised with Blix the preparations for their return on 19 October but they did not arrive on time because of the US decision. Then we were given 45 days by UN Security Council resolution 1441 to allow inspectors back and it only took the inspectors 19 days to return. But none of this has been a good enough reason for the Americans to stop daily verbal assaults on Iraq and its government," the Iraqi source said.
The future of the inspection team in Iraq is likely to become clearer by 8 December when Iraq is due to present the Security Council with a full report on its alleged weapons programmes. American and British officials have repeatedly said that should Iraq present a report suggesting that it has no weapons of mass destruction then it will, by omitting information, be in material breach of 1441. And American officials have already claimed that Iraq is in material breach for shooting at American and British planes patrolling the no-fly zones -- established without a Security Council mandate -- in the south and north of Iraq.
"We have no reason to think, much less believe, that the Americans will not go ahead with their war plans even if they have been delayed by recent diplomatic moves," said the diplomat.
