BAGHDAD,
March 7 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Turkey urged the United States
Thursday to quell Israeli violence instead of pondering military moves on
Iraq, Anatolia news agency reported. "Rather than opening an
unnecessary war against Iraq, the rapidly escalating war between Israel and
Palestine should be ended," it quoted Turkish Prime Minister Bulent
Ecevit saying, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
He
said any military action against the regime of Saddam Hussein would be
"absolutely unnecessary," even if Baghdad remains opposed to the
return of UN arms inspectors. Ecevit reiterated that under the existing
international sanctions, Iraq was incapable of posing a threat to stability
in the region. Ecevit said turmoil in Iraq would deal a serious blow to the
Turkish economy, particularly the vital tourism sector, as the crisis-hit
country strives to recover with IMF support.
Turkey's
renewed objections to a strike on its southern neighbor ahead of a visit to
Ankara by U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney later this month. Turkey also
fears instability in Iraq could lead to the emergence of a Kurdish state in
mainly Kurdish northern Iraq, which has been outside Baghdad's control since
the 1991 Gulf War.
Turkish
support would be crucial for the U.S. if it decides to strike Iraq, just as
in the 1991 Gulf War when U.S. jets used bases in southern Turkey to launch
bombing raids on Baghdad. The Incirlik base is already host to U.S. and
British jets enforcing the northern no-fly zone over Iraq.
The
Turkish move comes after the United States Wednesday upstaged talks
Wednesday between the UN and Iraq by releasing pictures allegedly showing
that Iraq had diverted vehicles from a UN humanitarian program to its army.
The pictures, a mix of satellite photos, videoclips and Iraqi television
footage, were shown to members of the Security Council committee that
monitors UN sanctions imposed on Iraq after it invaded Kuwait in 1990.
The
committee met on the eve of talks between UN Secretary General Kofi Annan
and Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri. The talks are expected to focus on
the council's demand that UN inspectors be allowed to resume work to assess
Iraq's claim that it dismantled its weapons of mass destruction after being
forced out of Kuwait in the 1991 Gulf War.
Robert
Wood, a spokesman for the U.S. mission to the United Nations, said the
pictures showed hundreds of trucks, imported under the UN oil-for-food
program, which had been "diverted and converted to carry heavy
artillery", AFP reported.
Some
of the trucks appeared to have been stripped for spare parts, notably their
hydraulic systems, which "can be used as part of a missile
component," Wood told reporters outside the committee chamber.
Others,
including "Ural-type vehicles" were filmed towing 150-millimeter
howitzers in a military parade in Baghdad on December 31, 2001 he said.
"All this is in violation of UN resolutions," he added. Other
diplomats were less categorical.
The
United States, backed by Britain, has dropped broad hints that it will take
military action against Iraq unless UN weapons inspectors are allowed back
into the country to check that Baghdad no longer has weapons of mass
destruction.
UN
arms inspectors pulled out of Iraq in December 1998 amid deadlock with
Baghdad. Their withdrawal was followed by a U.S. and British bombing blitz.
The international community regularly accuses Iraq of hiding or developing
such weapons, while Baghdad has insisted several times since the 1991 Gulf
War that it has destroyed them.
U.S.
President George W. Bush, who has described Iraq as being part of an
"axis of evil" along with Iran and North Korea, is due to meet
British Prime Minister Tony Blair next month to discuss what action to take
against Baghdad.
Meanwhile,
Iraq has prepared for a certain military attack by U.S. and British forces,
Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz said in comments published Thursday.
"U.S. and British attacks are expected... and we have taken the
necessary preparations to face up to them," Aziz told a forum on
Iraqi-Lebanese relations late Wednesday, AFP reported.
The
Iraqi cabinet, which met under President Saddam Hussein's leadership
Wednesday, "studied the issue for many hours as well as the
preparations to face up to attacks," Aziz added. Washington and London
"are threatening Iraq with new and extensive attacks, adding to what
the country has already been through," Aziz said.
In
an interview with IslamOnline, Egyptian military expert and former army
Major General, Hossam Sweilam, claimed “no one can deny that Iraq has
weapons of mass destruction capabilities.” The most obvious proof of this,
Sweilam alleged, was when General Hussein Kamel, chief of Iraq's secret
weapons procurement program, left Baghdad in August 1995, defected to Jordan
and divulged supposed military secrets to Western intelligence. He later
returned but was killed shortly afterwards in an army mortar attack on his
home.
Kamel
supposedly disclosed evidence to prove that Saddam was hiding chemical and
biological weapons as well as projectiles, artillery shields and missile
warheads, adding that the Iraqi president would not launch them unless his
regime was threatened. “The Iraqis themselves who fled to the United
States and Europe disclosed similar information such as Iraq’s possession
of uranium 235,” Sweilam added.
“These
weapons are capable of annihilating people by thousands and millions. But it
is difficult for a United Nations body to discover places of weapons of mass
destruction because they are distributed in different areas all over
Iraq,” Sweilam claimed.
According
to Sweilam, it is therefore not strange to hear Tarek Aziz threatening to
use the country’s military capabilities that already exist to resist any
external attacks or threats on the Iraqi regime.
“Saddam
will use these weapons of mass destruction against the American interests in
the region, whereby it could strike countries supporting the U.S. such as
Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates or Qatar which has the biggest American
base in the Middle East. The result will be horrible for the area and
America will repulse,” he added.
With
additional reporting by Dalia Sheiha
