IRAQ: Saddam Hussein's eight sprawling presidential palaces, considered locations of prime interest by United Nations' weapons inspectors, are high on the list of his regime's suspected hiding places for weapons of mass destruction.
The inspectors' ability to work at those sites has been restricted by a four-year-old deal between the UN and Iraq that Washington is now pressing hard to scrap in a new UN Security Council resolution demanding that Baghdad disarm of chemical and biological weapons.
"We're not talking 'Sleeping Beauty' here," deputy US State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said yesterday in demanding that UN weapons inspectors be granted unfettered access to the palaces.
"We're talking massive structures, gigantic facilities, extremely well-guarded.
"What's he hiding?" Mr Reekerasked.
UN inspectors attempted to gain access to the compounds in 1997, but Baghdad refused, and the United States threatened to attack Iraq.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan went to the country in February 1998 to broker a deal to avoid military action.
The agreement allowed for a special one-time inspection but the compounds were otherwise placed off-limits, and the UN inspectors fled the country on the eve of US and British air strikes in late 1998.
The special group of UN inspectors, which included senior diplomats and representatives of the International Atomic Energy Agency, failed to find evidence of weapons of mass destruction at the eight sites, but noted signs there had been significant movements.
The chief UN arms inspector, Mr Hans Blix, reiterated yesterday that the return of inspectors to Iraq depended on the UN Security Council.
Mr Blix told reporters after briefing the council: "I hope it would not be a long delay" and added: "We are ready to go at the earliest practical opportunity." The five veto-carrying permanent members of the council are divided on whether to send Blix to Iraq with a tough new mandate, backed by an ultimatum to Iraq to co-operate with his team.
"It would be awkward if we were doing inspections and a new mandate with changed directives arrived," Blix said.
"We will abide by whatever the council decides," he added.
The director of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed El-Baradei, who also took part in the briefing, said he and Mr Blix had both "expressed the view that we would like to do effective inspections," and added:
"We need the unanimous support of the Security Council to do effective inspections."