FRANCE: France last night agreed to back a US-sponsored UN Security Council motion to have arms inspectors back in Iraq, after earlier indicating that "a few ambiguities" in a draft resolution needed to be ironed out. The deal came after Presidents Bush and Chirac spoke by telephone.
President Chirac "spoke this evening by telephone with President Bush on the subject of Iraq and finalised an agreement on the points that remained outstanding between France and the United States", his spokeswoman, Ms Catherine Colonna, said.
Paris sought assurances that the resolution would not allow the automatic use of force if Iraq fails to disarm. "A positive dynamic has been launched, and we hope that a consensus will be reached in the Security Council at Friday's vote," Ms Colonna said.
Mr Chirac spoke to Mr Bush while the French president was flying back to Paris from a French-Italian summit in Rome.
Before the agreement, Ms Colonna said France and Russia shared reservations about the new draft resolution, published on Wednesday.
Both countries, each of which have big-five veto powers on the council, stressed their opposition to the inclusion of anything in the text that could allow for automatic recourse to military force against Baghdad if it was deemed to be hindering weapons inspections.
President Chirac and President Putin of Russia exchanged views on the new resolution by telephone. They agreed there were still ambiguities in the modified text regarding the possibility of military action against Iraq, Ms Colonna said.
Mr Chirac believed especially that "there would be advantages to a resolution which was adopted unanimously. That would require that any risk of automatic (recourse to force) would therefore have to be excluded," Ms Colonna said.
Mr Putin spoke by telephone to the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, who at one stage yesterday said he believed negotiations over the resolution could go into next week. The conversation was described by Mr Blair's spokesman as "good and constructive".
The British Foreign Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, told MPs the joint resolution gave President Saddam Hussein "a final opportunity" to comply with UN disarmament requirements imposed after the 1991 Gulf War. He said the resolution did not mean military action was imminent, and that the prospect of war would recede if it was adopted by the Security Council.
The Chief UN weapons inspector, Mr Hans Blix, said an advance party from his Unmovic team could be in Baghdad within 10 days of the resolution being passed.
In a statement to MPs, Mr Straw said the resolution laid down a tight timetable for the readmission of inspectors and gave Mr Saddam the choice "to comply with the UN or face the serious consequences".
It provided for "extensive, intrusive" inspections of any site in Iraq, including Mr Saddam's presidential palaces, and was "a basis for an inspection regime designed not to go through the motions, but to achieve disarmament", he said.
He dismissed suggestions from some Labour backbenchers that the resolution was designed to make war inevitable.
Anti-war campaigner Ms Alice Mahon insisted: "If Iraq doesn't trip up, I'm pretty certain the United States will make sure it does."
But Mr Straw said: "This is a resolution which gives very realistic time-scales and Saddam Hussein can, if he wishes, comply with every last dot and comma."
He added: "Of course we have a plan for the possibility of military action, but I remain quite optimistic that if we get unanimity, this process can work."