Just another work day for U.N. inspectors

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- U.N. experts on Wednesday re-examined a site linked to Iraq's nuclear weapons program and another suspected of producing explosives, passing Christmas like any other day in their hunt for illicit weapons of mass destruction.

Saddam Hussein addressed his people for a second straight day, saying the Iraqi media should not cite foreign opinions at a time when Iraq is locked in a confrontation with the West.

"Quoting the opinion of others and their different points of views while they are in the camp of the adversaries ... is sabotage," Saddam said in a speech read by a state television announcer.

The inspectors searched a gas laboratory and a grain storage area in al-Taji, a vast complex they have inspected at least twice this month. The International Atomic Energy Agency has linked the site to Iraq's nuclear weapons program.

They also revisited Hatteen Fatah Explosives Factory, 40 miles south of Baghdad.

Hiro Ueki, a spokesman for the U.N. program in Baghdad, said Hatteen was a "very large complex that produces explosives for military bombs, shells and rockets."

Ueki said the inspectors focused on changes at the site in the last four years "that could aid a nuclear program."

Ajwad Kazem al-Nayef, chief engineer at Hatteen, told reporters the staff is trying to eliminate any doubts the inspectors have about the plant.

"We are opening all doors so they can fully see everything," said al-Nayef. "We are going to cooperate until, God willing, we will prove that this site, and other sites, don't have anything that we can hide from them."

In a Christmas Eve speech Tuesday, Saddam said the outcome of the inspection operations would "be a big shock to the United States and will expose all the American lies."

The inspectors have been working in Iraq since Nov. 27 under a U.N. Security Council resolution that threatens serious consequences if Iraq fails to eliminate nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and ballistic missiles.

In the first round of inspections in the 1990s, after Iraq's defeat in the Gulf War, the United Nations destroyed tons of Iraqi chemical and biological weapons and dismantled Iraq's nuclear weapons program.

But inspectors do not believe they got all Iraq's banned arsenal. The United States and Britain have threatened war to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction.

That monitoring regime broke down in 1998 amid U.N.-Iraqi disputes and the inspectors now in Iraq are the first to work here in four years.

As the inspectors made their rounds, Iraq's Christian minority celebrated Christmas with prayers and carols.

"Yesterday and today I prayed for peace," said Father Boutros Hadad at the Chaldean Virgin Mary Church in Baghdad. "The theme was: Don't be afraid, God is with us, he will rescue us."

Outside the church, worshippers sang Christmas carols and women lit candles and distributed sweets.

Few Christmas trees could be seen in Baghdad, and only Christians take the day off.

Christians represent about 5 percent of Iraq's 22 million population and live mainly in Baghdad and the north. Iraq is predominantly Muslim and officially secular.