Iraq clears way for U.N. inspections

From wire reports

Iraq agreed Tuesday to a plan for the return of U.N. weapons inspectors for the first time in nearly four years, but the deal ignores U.S. demands for access to Saddam Hussein's palaces and other contested sites.

Chief U.N. inspector Hans Blix said an advance team of inspectors could be in Iraq in two weeks if it gets the go-ahead from the U.N. Security Council.

Blix said the agreement on logistics, hammered out in two days of talks in Vienna, called for "immediate, unconditional and unrestricted access" to most suspect sites.

But, he said, eight presidential sites -- 12 square miles of territory -- would remain off-limits to surprise inspections unless the U.N. Security Council bends to U.S. demands that all sites be subject to unannounced visits. Besides the palaces, also declared off-limits were several government ministries, including defense and interior, as well as the headquarters of the elite Republican Guard.

Under a 1998 deal worked out between U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Baghdad, the inspectors are not allowed to visit the presidential sites unannounced and must be accompanied by a team of international diplomats when they do.

The chief Iraqi negotiator, Gen. Amir al-Sadi, sought to deflect attention from the presidential sites.

"Quite honestly, I don't understand why it is so critical," al-Sadi said, adding that on the whole, Baghdad was "happy with this agreement." He and Blix agreed that the issue of presidential sites had not been on the agenda at the meetings in Vienna, Austria.

The White House made its hard line on Iraq even harsher Tuesday, as spokesman Ari Fleischer invited the Iraqi people to assassinate their president, Saddam Hussein, as an alternative to war.

Asked about new estimates that war with Iraq could cost up to $9 billion a month, Fleischer said "the cost of one bullet, if the Iraqi people take it on themselves, is substantially less than that. ... Regime change is welcome in whatever form it takes."

The United States also moved negotiations on its tough new proposal for Iraq to the United Nations on Tuesday, meeting with permanent members of the Security Council opposed to authorizing force against Saddam before testing his willingness to cooperate.

At the meeting, ambassadors from the United States, Britain, Russia, France and China discussed the resolution's so-called "or else" clause which warns Saddam to cooperate or face military action from member states.

The draft resolution would also give member states the right to give military support to inspections.

French proposal rejected

France and Russia vehemently oppose the U.S. position, with Paris floating its own proposal for a two-phased approach which would only authorize force if Iraq failed to cooperate with inspectors.

Bush rejected the French proposal.

"The United Nations must show its backbone," Bush said. "What I won't accept is something that allows Saddam Hussein to continue to lie, deceive the world. He's been doing that for 11 years. I'm just not going to accept something that is weak. It is not worth it."

However, a senior U.S. official in Washington told The Associated Press that all five veto-holding members agreed that a new system of inspections -- after a four-year absence -- must be worked out to open Hussein's palaces.

The United States and Britain have drafted a new plan that would give Iraq seven days after adoption of the resolution to declare whether it would comply, and then 23 days to list all sites where weapons are stored, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Also, the resolution contains a provision giving inspectors the authority to declare "no-fly" and "no-drive" zones that would keep out Iraqi officials while the inspections proceed.