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Schroeder branded as a “mistake” a forceful call for military action from U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney
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BERLIN,
August 28 (News Agencies) – German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and
German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer warned Wednesday, August 28,
that a pre-emptive U.S. attack against Iraq could lead to a new order
in the Middle East, as Berlin stepped up its criticism of U.S. talk of
war.
One
day after Schroeder branded as a “mistake” a forceful call for
military action from U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, Fischer said he
did not think such ideas had been “thought through” to the end,
Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
He
told Deutschlandfunk radio that if Washington nevertheless
decided to strike Iraq, it must take responsibility for the
consequences for peace and stability in the Middle East for years to
come.
“It
would lead to a new order in the Middle East and there is a big
question mark as to whether this consequence has been thought through
and discussed in the United States,” Fischer said.
He
said Berlin had made its views clear to Washington because Europe,
being a neighbor to the Middle East, would be directly affected by
hasty action.
“That
is why we have made our position clear, that we reject mistaken steps
and will not take part in them.”
Schroeder
told German television, RTL, late Tuesday that it was wrong of
Washington to be changing the original goal of trying to get U.N.
weapons inspectors back into Iraq, to one now of seeking a regime
change in Baghdad.
“It
would be hard to persuade somebody who is supposed to be overthrown
through military intervention to allow inspectors into the country,”
he said, referring to Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
The
chancellor has come out strongly in recent weeks against Germany
taking part in any military action against Iraq without a U.N.
mandate.
Schroeder,
who is in the throes of an election campaign ahead of September 22
federal elections, insists Germany remains a close ally in the war
against terror, but will not get involved in any “adventure.”
In
another development, Iraq’s Foreign Minister Naji Sabri was holding
a further series of meetings in Beijing on Wednesday, after receiving
a boost as China reiterated of its opposition to military action
against Baghdad.
Sabri
was due to meet Vice Premier Qian Qichen at the tightly-guarded
Zhongnanhai leadership compound, following talks with senior foreign
policy officials from parliament and the Communist Party.
On
Tuesday, Sabri’s Chinese counterpart Tang Jiaxuan gave Baghdad some
much-needed backing amid relentless U.S. talk of the need to remove
Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein from power, saying Beijing firmly opposed
the use of force.
“The
Iraq question should be resolved within the framework of the U.N. by
diplomatic and political means,” Tang said, according to state-run
Chinese television.
“Resorting
to force or threatening to resort to force will not solve the problem;
on the contrary it leads to more tensions and troubles,” he said.
The
comments were no more than a restatement of China’s long-held
position, but have a symbolic value in being made directly to an Iraqi
guest as Washington ratchets up its war of words against Baghdad.
Meanwhile
in the U.K., opposition to British support of a U.S.-led war against
Iraq has hardened among Britain’s ruling Labor Party voters with a
majority now opposed to military strikes, according to a London
newspaper poll published Wednesday.
Fifty-two
percent of Labor respondents told an ICM poll for the Guardian that
Prime Minister Tony Blair should not support U.S. policy on Iraq - up
six percentage points from a similar survey carried out by the daily
in March.
The
latest poll showed a gap of 17 percent between Labor-supporting doves
and hawks, as 35 percent of respondents agreed that Blair should back
Washington's desire to topple Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Britain
is widely expected to join any U.S. military attack on Iraq, though
the Labor government has been less explicit than the United States in
identifying “regime change” as a strategic aim.
Also
in France, French Foreign Minister, Dominique de Villepin, warned
Tuesday that the United States must not attack Iraq without UN
Security Council authorization, and said an over-reliance on force did
not in itself provide any solutions.
Speaking
to an annual gathering of the more than 200 French ambassadors and
senior diplomats posted around the world, de Villepin insisted that,
even though France demanded an unconditional return of U.N. arms
inspectors to Iraq, “no military action can be conducted without a
decision of the Security Council”.
In
a clear reference to the United States, he also said that “the use
of force alone very often seems like a vain use of force” and added
that “an overuse of power corrodes that power”.
The
comments reinforce the general E.U. stance that, should Washington
make real its threats of an attack on Iraq, it should not count on
help from its allies this time, in contrast to the 1991 Gulf War, AFP
said.
