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US, France agree on Iraq draft
( 2002-11-08 07:50 ) (7 )

The United States and France reached agreement Thursday on a new Security Council resolution on Iraq, removing a key hurdle toward passage of the U.S.-drafted plan for tough new weapons inspections.

French diplomats said the compromise was reached through negotiations at the United Nations and in telephone calls between President Bush and French President Jacques Chirac over the last day.

According to French diplomats, the United States agreed to change wording in a key provision that would declare Iraq in "material breach" of its U.N. obligations. The change addresses French and Russian concerns that the original wording would have let the United States determine on its own whether Iraq had committed an infraction. Such a determination, France and Russia feared, would have triggered an attack on Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

"The Security Council will now be the ones to decide whether Iraq is in material breach," said a French diplomat, on condition of anonymity.

Russia, like France, also appeared to be softening its position in favor of the American draft.

The latest American text, a product of eight weeks of intense lobbying by the Bush administration, signaled significant progress and included major concessions to Security Council members concerned about setting off another war in Iraq.

Bush said he wanted a vote Friday although Syria wanted it postponed because of an Arab League meeting this weekend in Egypt.

The president also spoke by telephone with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday as lobbying intensified a day before Washington planned to push for a vote on the resolution.

"He's a real threat," Bush said of Saddam, "and it's now time for the world to come together and disarm him."

Security Council members were expecting U.S. and British diplomats to circulate a revised text later Thursday with the new wording agreed upon earlier in the day.

Russian Ambassador Sergey Lavrov told The Associated Press a Friday vote was possible if the United States and Britain come up with a few more concessions. U.S. and British diplomats said a new version could be ready by the end of the day Thursday.

The U.S. draft resolution includes a greater role for the Security Council but still frees the United States to take military action against Iraq if inspectors say it isn't complying.

In Iraq, the government-controlled media called the draft resolution a pretext for war and urged the Security Council not to bow to American demands.

"America wants to use this resolution as a pretext and a cover for its aggression on Iraq and the whole Arab nation," the ruling Baath Party newspaper Al-Thawra said Thursday. "The Security Council should not give (the Americans) a pretext and a cover for the coming aggression."

That would give Iraq until Nov. 15 to accept the resolution's terms and could put an advance team of inspectors on the ground — for the first time in nearly four years — by the end of the month.

According to a strict timeline in the resolution, inspectors would have up to 45 days to actually begin work, and must report to the council 60 days later on Iraq's performance. In the meantime, any Iraqi obstructions or noncompliance would be reported immediately to the council for assessment.

At the same time, it offers Iraq the possibility of lifting a decade of crippling sanctions if it complies fully with its obligations.

U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte said the new resolution, co-sponsored with Britain, offered Iraq the best opportunity to avoid war.

For a resolution to be adopted, it needs at least nine "yes" votes and no veto by permanent members Russia, France, China, Britain and the United States. None of the five are likely to veto, though an abstention from Russia could hurt the resolution's credibility. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has said the way to send a strong message to Iraq is through unity.

Syria, Iraq's Arab neighbor, appeared to be the most likely of the 15 council members who could abstain or vote against the resolution.

On Thursday, China's Foreign Ministry said it had noted improvements in the new draft, but wouldn't say whether China would endorse it.

"On the whole, we believe the new resolution takes into consideration some of the concerns and worries of other countries," spokesman Kong Quan said.

Negotiations for a new Iraq resolution began after Bush's Sept. 12 speech to the U.N. General Assembly, when he challenged world leaders to get tough with Iraq or stand aside as the United States acted.

The speech was followed by a toughly worded draft resolution that went through several revisions to address opposition from council members and inspectors.

The latest version softens one reference to Iraq being in "material breach" of its obligations to disarm under a decade of U.N. resolutions in place since the 1991 Persian Gulf War. But a second reference still bothers Russia and France which believe the legal term could be used to justify war.

A cornerstone of the U.S. proposal is a tough new inspections regime responsible for hunting for illicit weapons and reporting on any Iraqi failures to comply with its disarmament obligations.

It requires Iraq to provide inspectors with "immediate, unimpeded, unconditional, and unrestricted access to any and all" areas, including eight presidential sites, where advance notice was previously needed for inspections.

Inspectors can also decide whether to interview Iraqi scientists and government officials outside the country.