ACCESSION NUMBER:00000

FILE ID:95082501.TXT

DATE:08/25/95

TITLE:25-08-95  IRAQ'S DECEPTION ON WEAPONS IS "COORDINATED" BY GOVERNMENT



TEXT:

(Text: Albright remarks)  (740)



United Nations -- U.S. Ambassador Madeleine Albright August 25

described as "chilling" Iraq's admission of accelerated, advanced

programs to produce and deploy nuclear and biological weapons.



Speaking with journalists after a private council meeting with Rolf

Ekeus, chairman of the U.N. Commission overseeing the destruction of

Iraqi weapons (UNSCOM), Albright said that "the new information shows

that Iraq had a more dangerous weapons program before and after the

Gulf War than even UNSCOM had known."



The ambassador discounted Baghdad's claim that the program was all the

work of Lieutenant General Hussein Kamel, a son-in-law of Iraqi

President Saddam Hussein who recently defected to Jordan.



"Iraq's four-year long approach of false cooperation with UNSCOM is

not the work of a single individual, but the coordinated policy of the

Iraqi government," she said.



Following is the text of the ambassador's remarks:



(begin text)



Good morning, because of the importance on what we have just heard in

the council I would like to read a statement. We just received a

chilling briefing from Ambassador Ekeus providing major new

revelations of Iraq's efforts to produce and deploy nuclear and

biological weapons.



I would like to highlight three of those. First, Iraq produced

additional biological agents beyond the two previously disclosed. Two,

they had a comprehensive program to produce and deploy some 200 fully

capable biological warheads for delivery by air and long range

missiles, and they stood down after the United States made clear the

consequences of using such weapons. And three, Iraq launched a crash

program to deploy a nuclear device before the Gulf War and their

target date was April 1991.



The latest disclosures from Baghdad say much more about the

credibility of the Iraqi government, and the threat it still poses to

the region, than they do about the possibility of lifting sanctions

anytime soon.



On credibility: even when the Iraqi government provides information,

it feels compelled to wrap it in a package of falsehood. Iraq has

again insulted the intelligence of the council with a story even a

child could not believe: that in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, Hussein Kamel

singlehandedly ran a weapons program involving Cabinet ministers and

thousands of specialists, and managed to conceal details of it from

Saddam Hussein himself.



Iraq's four-year long approach of false cooperation with UNSCOM is not

the work of a single individual, but the coordinated policy of the

Iraqi government. The new disclosures by Iraqi officials show that

these same officials were consciously lying to UNSCOM just three weeks

ago when they said then they had provided full information on their

biological weapons program.



Clearly, UNSCOM was correct to resist pressure some months ago from

Iraq and some council members to say that the nuclear, chemical and

missile files should be closed. These files are very much open and

should remain so.



Literally dozens of times the Iraqis have said that they have provided

full information on a particular subject. Every single time, the

United States has not believed that statement, and every single time

we have been correct. For anyone to believe Iraq when it now says it

has come clean would be naive in the extreme.



More importantly, the new information shows that Iraq had a more

dangerous weapons program before and after the Gulf War than even

UNSCOM had known. Iraq continued its work in these areas even after it

"accepted" Resolution 687, even when it claimed sanctions were

reducing Iraq to poverty. It did its best to preserve major elements

of its program in order to revive it as soon as possible.



The verification process will be long and difficult, but it is made

necessary by the Iraqi Government's utter lack of credibility. The

United States will assist UNSCOM in any way possible in the rapid and

complete analysis of the information supplied by Iraq.



Until now, Iraq has pursued a two-fold strategy: providing minimal

cooperation to UNSCOM, and ignoring all of its other requirements. If

it is now ready to change both parts of that strategy, and follows

through, that would be significant news.



However, it will not be enough for Iraq only to address the weapons of

mass destruction issues. Our position, shared by most members of this

council, remains that Iraq must be in overall compliance with all of

its obligations before we can consider modifying the sanctions regime.



(end text)

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