WASHINGTON, Jan 25: President Bill Clinton and his top foreign policy advisors have affirmed a tough stance against Iraq's latest intransigence amid growing speculation about the possibility of a military strike.Clinton met Vice President Al Gore and other top foreign policy advisors to review the situation in Iraq and discuss ``possible next steps'', a White House official said.
Iraq is locked in a dispute with the United Nations over access for UN inspectors charged with dismantling its weapons of mass destruction. Baghdad has blocked the inspectors from sensitive ``presidential sites'' and in November 1997 it briefly expelled US members of the inspection team.
Clinton's foreign policy advisors met twice at the White House yesterday, the first time without the President and the second time with him.
They reviewed a report to the UN Security Council on Friday from the Chief UN arms inspector, Richard Butler. He said Iraq seemed determined to withhold any new information about its weapons programs
and to prevent UN inspectors from obtaining it themselves if that meant entering certain sites.
The White House official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Clinton and his advisors agreed with Butler's conclusion that the arms inspectors could not carry out their mission under the present circumstances.
``This is a serious matter. The National Security team plans close consultation with other members of the Security Council and partners in the Gulf region in the coming days,'' the officials said.
He said the purpose of yesterday's meetings was ``to review options, not make a decision. The President and his advisors reaffirmed that all options remain on the table.''
Quoting highly placed US officials, the Washington Post reported yesterday that a consensus among senior Clinton advisors emerged during hours of intensive White House meetings in recent days that military action will be necessary to force Iraq's compliance with UN resolutions.
Already many of these discussions were focussing on
what actions follow in the aftermath of a heavy air bombardment campaign led by the United States with assistance from Britain, according to the report.
Under one scenario being considered by the administration, an air campaign lasting several days would be followed by an expansion of the No-Fly zones over Iraq to cover the entire country, the Post said.
Asked about the report, a US official said: ``No decisions have been made. The President has not approved any action, so it's premature to jump to speculative conclusions.''
But the official admitted the United States and its allies were ``losing patience'' with Iraq.
Meanwhile, the Iraqi Cabinet has discussed preparations for a possible war with the United States even as the influential paper Babel run by President Saddam Hussein's son Uday said US President Bill Clinton might attack Iraq to divert attention from his sexual misdemeanours, reports from Dubai said today.
The Cabinet reviewed the necessary preparations for popular weapons training to
face the latest developments in ``the American imperiousness over Iraq,'' Iraqi news agency INA said today.
``Iraq refuses to be a scapegoat for Clinton's problems, and it is not a banana republic which can be terrorised with the massing of an armada,'' the Babel said in a reference to the US naval forces stationed in the Gulf.
Saddam Hussein met senior ministers to finalise the volunteers' mobilisation which he had ordered on January 17. People of all ages have been urged to report to the ruling Baath Party offices from February one for ``enrolment and weapons training''.
Saddam has given the UN weapons inspectors six months time to finish their work or quit Iraq.
The US, under apparent pressure from the new sex scandal hounding the President, has threatened to use force, a policy that has few backers in the Security Council.
Iraq has received some support from France, China and Russia with Moscow even offering its reconnaissance planes for weapons monitoring flights replacing the American U2
planes which Baghdad says are snooping for the US.
Chief weapons inspector Richard Butler is back in New York after meeting Iraq's deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz and other senior officials in Baghdad.
A UN resolution adopted after the 1991 Gulf War says the sanctions cannot be lifted until weapons inspectors certify that Iraq has no weapons of mass destruction.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
