US: Adopting an apparently more moderate tone than other US leaders, Secretary of State Mr Colin Powell has insisted the return of weapons inspectors to Baghdad was a priority, but Iraq said the United States was creating pretexts for a military strike.
With Mr Powell seeming to differ with Vice-President Mr Dick Cheney over the need to get United Nations inspectors back into Iraq, President Bush came under renewed attack from across the political spectrum at home for failing to present a unified line.
And Iraq's foreign ministry issued a statement charging the United States with spreading "misleading allegations and lies on its weapons of mass destruction" to justify pre-emptive military action.
Mr Powell said the "first step" towards solving the Iraq crisis should be the return of weapons inspectors to assess Mr Saddam's arms capability.
In an interview with BBC television, Mr Powell said Mr Bush wanted to see the inspectors, who were forced out in December 1998, go back in.
"The President has been clear that he believes weapons inspectors should return," Mr Powell said in an extract from the interview, which is due to be broadcast in full on September 8th.
Mr Powell also said he understood that the international community needed more information about the threat posed by Mr Saddam before it could decide on what should be done.
"A debate is needed within the international community so that everybody can make a judgment about this."
Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Tareq Aziz, said Mr Cheney had provided no evidence to support pre-emptive action.
"They are telling wrongly . . . that Iraq is reproducing weapons of mass destruction," Mr Aziz said in a CNN interview.
"That's not true. We are ready to prove it. We are ready to prove it by technical, viable means." Allowing weapons inspectors back into Iraq under the direction of chief UN arms inspector Mr Hans Blix was not an option. "It's a non-starter because it's not going to bring about a conclusion," Mr Aziz said.
Mr Powell's comments underlined an emerging split between so-called hawks in the American administration such as Mr Cheney and Defence Secretary Mr Donald Rumsfeld, who back military action against Baghdad, and more cautious voices at home and abroad.
White House spokesman Mr Scott McClellan said there was no difference between Mr Powell's comments and the Bush administration's position, which he said demanded "unfettered" inspections of Iraq's capability for weapons of mass destruction.
Others were not impressed by Mr Bush's performance so far.
"There have been nuanced disagreements from day one . . . and they should be brought under control," said former secretary of state Mr Alexander Haig, a Republican. "He's got to lead, he's got to unify, he's got to . . . start speaking with one voice."
British Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair said on Saturday that the world could not stand by and allow Iraq to develop weapons of mass destruction in "flagrant breach" of United Nations resolutions. He said "doing nothing about Iraq's breach of these UN resolutions is not an option" but stressed that no decisions had been made about what action should be taken.
With Mr Blair already under pressure from within his own Labour Party, the Conservative leader, Mr Iain Duncan Smith, warned him against prevaricating over Iraq and accused him of allowing debate on military action to "drift".