Iraq Says a U.N. Team Can Return; U.S. Dismisses Offer

UNITED NATIONS —  Iraq said Monday that it would allow U.N. arms inspectors unconditional access to suspected weapons sites, an effort to avoid attack that will test the Security Council’s growing support for U.S. demands for action.

While U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan expressed hopes that the offer was the first step in defusing the conflict, the Bush administration immediately dismissed it as “a tactic that will fail.”

U.S. officials said the Iraqi offer echoed Baghdad’s earlier maneuvers to stall and divide the council, and dealt only with weapons inspections, not with the host of other U.N. resolutions Iraq has violated. They said the United States would continue pressing for a new U.N. resolution requiring Iraq to disarm.

But Iraq’s move puts pressure on the newly united Security Council. British officials, anticipating such a move by Baghdad, rejected the offer. Diplomats from Russia and France, also Security Council members, supported the return of weapons inspectors and cautioned that the U.S. should work through the council. French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin warned that Washington should think twice before striking alone. “This could be the most important foreign policy decision they will take since World War II,” he said Monday.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri wrote in a letter to Annan that “to remove any doubts that Iraq still possesses weapons of mass destruction,” Iraqi authorities would allow inspectors to continue their work “without conditions.”

Iraq is ready to start immediate discussions on the details of the inspectors’ return, the letter said.

Annan credited President Bush’s speech Thursday with prompting Iraq’s offer. In the address, Bush challenged the U.N. to act against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein or to stand back to let the U.S. strike.

“I believe the president’s speech galvanized the international community,” Annan said. “Almost every speaker in the General Assembly urged Iraq to accept the return of the inspectors.”

Besides the threat of war, pressure by Iraq’s Arab neighbors strongly influenced Baghdad, diplomats say. Annan praised the head of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, “for his strenuous efforts in helping to convince Iraq.”

The turning point came Saturday in a confidential meeting Moussa arranged in Annan’s office with Arab foreign ministers and Sabri.

“This buys the region some time to try to change the dynamics by putting pressure on Iraq to convince them they have to cooperate fully or it’ll be their last chance,” said a senior Arab diplomat who was at the meeting. “We were on a collision course, and now we’ve avoided a collision--for now. So let’s give the inspectors a chance and see where it leads us.”

The U.S. reaction was much harsher.

“This is not a matter of inspections,” said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. “It is about disarmament of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and the Iraqi regime’s compliance with all other Security Council resolutions.

“This is a tactical step by Iraq in hopes of avoiding strong U.N. Security Council action,” he said. “As such, it is a tactic that will fail. It is time for the Security Council to act.”

A U.S. official at the United Nations said any return to Iraq by weapons inspectors was likely to be short-lived.

“We have been through this before. We are very skeptical that the Iraqis can be trusted even if they invite the inspectors back in,” he said. “We fully expect Iraq not to comply.”

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, in comments made before Iraq’s offer became public, said that previous announcements “have been an alternative to doing what Iraq is required to do by international law, which is to readmit the inspectors without condition and without restriction.”

De Villepin said the Security Council must discuss what to do after inspectors return.

News agencies quoted Russia’s foreign minister, Igor S. Ivanov, as saying that Iraq’s offer ended the need for any new resolution against it.

Other diplomats warned that Iraq is offering the bare minimum to evade a U.S. attack. The letter does not promise to fulfill Baghdad’s obligation to allow “full and unfettered” access by the U.N. inspectors. And it’s not a promise to disarm, but just an invitation for inspectors to come look.

“At best, it’s Iraq willing to take the first step. At worst, it’s another false promise,” said a senior State Department official traveling with Secretary of State Colin L. Powell Monday night. He said that a new resolution must contain three elements: a statement that Iraq has breached U.N. resolutions, specifications of what Iraq must do to prove cooperation with the U.N., and the consequences if Iraq fails to comply.

U.S. officials portrayed the letter’s offer to discuss “practical arrangements” for the resumption of inspections as a potential quagmire. Hans Blix, the head of the U.N. weapons inspection team, said in an interview Friday that he must settle issues ranging from the use of helicopter landing pads to establishing regional offices before he can send inspectors back to begin their work. While the U.N. can send a set-up team to Baghdad “within days,” he said, those practical discussions could take several weeks, and procuring equipment could take up to a month.

Unless a new resolution changes the terms of the inspections, Blix’s team will have 60 days to reequip and visit old sites to define their mission before officially starting work. The inspection team will expect “full, unfettered access” to any site at any time.

Iraq is expected to have carefully concealed any ongoing weapons development in the four years that the inspectors have been kept out of the country. Blix expects that weapons projects will have been replicated across the nation, moved underground or onto mobile laboratories to avoid detection.

As Iraq made its offer Monday, the United States shifted its own approach, scrapping the idea of “coercive inspections,” or deploying troops in or near Iraq to back up U.N. weapons inspectors.

Powell, who returned to the United Nations on Monday to lobby for international support for confronting Baghdad, will instead push for a “one-strike” policy that would allow U.N. members to use military force the first time Iraq blocked weapons inspectors, U.S. officials said.

Coercive inspections would have included the option of using force to ensure that U.N. teams gained access to facilities, documents and personnel involved with the production of any nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and ballistic missiles. The one-strike policy would mean ending inspections after a single Iraqi refusal to cooperate--and then permitting a military operation.

Powell said he had been encouraged by the transformation in discussions about Iraq since Bush called on the world body to stand together to make Hussein end 11 years of defiance on disarmament and other promises on political, economic and humanitarian issues.

“I’m very pleased at the response that the president’s speech has generated. I’ve had quite a number of bilateral meetings, and I think that the political dynamic has changed and there is a great deal of pressure now being placed upon Iraq to come into compliance with the U.N. mandates,” Powell told reporters.

Speaking before Iraq made its latest offer, Powell predicted that a strong resolution would be passed soon. Other U.S. and U.N. diplomats had said they expected a draft resolution to begin circulating next week, with a push for swift passage.

The United States wants any resolution to cover more than Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.

“There will be, in the not too distant future I hope, a new resolution from the United Nations that I think will capture all the violations of the last 11 years,” Powell said.

France and many Arab countries proposed a two-step approach that called for two resolutions--one covering the return of weapons inspectors and a second one authorizing the use of force.

“You need the support of the other countries. You just cannot go and do things alone. We insist on the two-part process to build confidence, to build the support of the international community,” De Villepin, the French foreign minister, told reporters Monday.

France also wants to wait to pass the second resolution until after Iraq violates the first resolution.

The United States favors a single resolution, fearing that having two will allow Hussein time to manipulate and draw out the process. It might also require another major U.S. diplomatic effort to win backing for a second one.