Posted: 8/5/2002 6:18:31 AM EDT
[url]http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,4840792%255E401,00.html[/url] AN Iraqi politician says President Saddam Hussein will soon use weapons of mass destruction.
Opposition Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmad Chalabi warned: "Saddam has advanced chemical weapons, he has advanced biological weapons, and he has produced and engineered biological weapons which contain a combination of viruses such as smallpox and ebola.
"Those are very, very dangerous weapons and I think, in his hands, he is bound to use them in terrorist action very soon."
He told Fox television the Iraqi president is "working very hard ... to position people and to move with biological and chemical terrorism across the important centers of the world".
"I think Saddam now is still uncertain the United States is going to move against him and he has strategies to deal with this.
"He has of course invited the weapons inspectors ... back to Iraq, but of course all of this is a delaying tactic."
Pressed on the source of his information, Chalabi said: "We have people who have worked in the (alleged Iraqi) program who have come out recently and have contacted us, and now they are in the United States and they are talking to the US government and they have demonstrated with unquestioned authority that Saddam does have biological weapons.
"They have described sites, ... described in detail the kind of material that is being introduced and also weaponising processes."
Chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix ruled out a visit to Baghdad for talks on renewed arms inspections, as the war of words stepped up between Iraq and the administration of US President George W. Bush.
"Psychologically, I think it would be better that an official of my political standing does not go to Baghdad before they (the Iraqis) accept inspections," Blix told the Arabic-language Al-Hayat newspaper.
Holding talks in Baghdad with Iraqi authorities at this stage "will raise expectations without foundation," said the Swede who heads the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), which has never set foot in Iraq.
In a letter to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan late on Thursday, Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri extended an invitation to Blix and members of his team to discuss the possible resumption of weapons inspections, halted in December 1998.
But Blix said the chances of a possible war against Baghdad would go up if he were to visit but talks were unsuccessful. "The situation will be much worse if I visit Baghdad and the talks fail. We do not want hopes raised."
State-run Baghdad media has slammed the United States for rejecting Iraq's invitation to the chief UN weapons inspector. View Quote [b]Whitehall dossier says Saddam plans biological weapons for Palestinians[/b] [url]http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-373053,00.html[/url] SADDAM HUSSEIN is suspected of planning to arm a Palestinian terrorist group with biological weapons to attack either American or Israeli targets. A Whitehall dossier containing a detailed assessment of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction programme, which has been circulated to the Prime Minister and other senior Cabinet ministers, is understood to focus on Iraq’s biological weapons capability.
Details of the dossier came to light as the United Nations rejected a new offer from the Iraqi leader. Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary-General, said that an Iraqi letter calling for a further round of technical talks with Hans Blix, the head weapons inspector, set conditions “at variance” with the demands of the United Nations Security Council.
Using mobile laboratories for their research, the team of scientists working for Saddam are believed to be developing a range of biological agents that can be “delivered” by an aerosol system.
The latest assessment in Washington and London is that Saddam’s plan is to produce a basic weapon that can be used by a terrorist group to attack the Iraqi leader’s enemies, the United States and Israel. In the same way that Iran has funded and trained terrorist groups to carry out attacks from Lebanon against Israel, Saddam, according to the assessment, could be banking on recruiting a Palestinian terrorist group to act on his behalf.
Analysis of US satellite imagery over the past four years has provided sufficient evidence to show what Saddam has been doing since the expulsion of the United Nations weapons inspectors in December 1998. While the Iraqi leader has pursued all elements of his weapons of mass destruction programme, he has made greatest progress in trying to “weaponise” his biological systems, using the mobile research laboratories to try to deceive America’s spy satellites.
The Iraqi leader knows from experience that it is far more difficult to hide work on nuclear weapons because of the substantial infrastructure required. Saddam’s attempts to develop long-range ballistic missiles, capable of reaching America, have also been carefully monitored from space and there is no sign that he has succeeded beyond trying to modify old Russian Scud missiles.
In assessing the threat posed by Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction programme, the emphasis has, therefore, been on his biological warfare projects, which pose as great a threat as nuclear devices and can be developed relatively easily away from the sensors of America’s spy satellites.
The Palestinian connection is now at the heart of intelligence thinking. Despite the belief in some quarters in America that a senior officer in Saddam’s intelligence service met an al-Qaeda terrorist in Prague last year, before September 11, this is given no credence by the CIA, the FBI or by British Intelligence.
Saddam has funded Palestinian extremist groups for many years, and the assessment now is that, with the Middle East in turmoil, the Iraqi leader may see that the best way of taking revenge against the US and Israel is by using a Palestinian organisation as his proxy terrorists.
View Quote Who wants to bet that if Sadam uses biological weapons That he will get a Nuke stuck up his ass ?
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