An Iraqi journalist looks at the remains of Iraqi missile heads in Aziziyah, 90 km south of Baghdad

BAGHDAD, March 3 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Iraq is to deliver a report to the United Nations in around a week from now on the quantities of anthrax and VX agent it said to have destroyed 11 years ago, the UNMOVIC spokesman said Monday, March 3, in Baghdad, as Iraq continued its destruction of missiles under U.N. supervision for a third day.

"They informed us that they will submit a report, a more detailed report, in about a week concerning anthrax and VX," Agence France-Presse (AFP) quoted Hiro Ueki as saying.

It follows more than three hours of technical discussions late Sunday, March 2, in Baghdad between U.N. and Iraqi officials on the chemical and biological weapons over which U.N. disarmament inspectors have been seeking clarification.

Amer al-Saadi, President Saddam Hussein's top weapons advisor, said Sunday that ongoing excavations had unearthed significant traces of the arms and agents which the regime says it destroyed unilaterally in 1991.

Excavations at the al-Aziziya air base southwest of Baghdad had uncovered fragments of nearly all 157 bombs filled with tons of toxic agents that Iraq insisted it had destroyed unilaterally in 1991.

Al-Saadi said 1.5 tons of VX still to be accounted for was unilaterally destroyed and was being discussed with U.N. experts.

"So as you can see, there is proactive cooperation on the Iraqi side," said Saadi, adding that U.N. inspectors conducted three private interviews with Iraqi scientists in recent days.

"My task, my only task (is) to remove all excuses for waging war ... If war today takes place, it is not because Iraq did not do all it should regarding disarmament."

Ueki said tests would also be carried out at another site, Al-Hakam, where the Iraqis say they destroyed 1.5 tons of the deadly nerve agent VX.

Iraq Scraps More Six Missiles

Meanwhile, the Iraqis resumed the process of destroying banned Al-Samoud 2 missiles at a site outside the capital, as it scrapped six more missiles of banned Al-Samoud 2 missiles Monday, bringing the total in three days to 16.

 Uday al-Tai, the director general of Iraq's information ministry, told AFP that six out of at least seven scheduled to be disposed of during the day had been destroyed by midda, adding that up to nine would be scrapped Monday.

Baghdad says there are about 100 Al-Samoud 2 missiles, which breach the 150-kilometre (93-mile) range limit set by UN resolutions.

Compliance with the order to destroy the rockets was seen as a key test of whether Iraq was cooperating with the U.N. inspectors sent in last November to investigate its alleged program of weapons of mass destruction.

The United States and Britain claim Saddam continues to hide such weapons, and have massed more than 240,000 troops in the region ready to attack Iraq.  

New Resolution May Be Debated Friday

Newspaper reports in Britain suggested that Washington and London were prepared to launch an attack immediately after a new U.N. Security Council vote, regardless of its outcome, in two to three weeks’ time.

And New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark said she believed war in Iraq was likely around March 17 and predicted a U.N. Security Council debate on the issue would open Friday, March 7.

Britain, Spain and the United States sponsored a new U.N. resolution declaring Iraq in non-compliance with earlier UN demands that it disarm, which would in effect authorize the use of force. A counter-proposal by France, Germany and Russia calls for more inspections.

A vote on the resolution was expected after chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix presents his latest report to the U.N. Security Council on Friday, March 7.

Also on Monday, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi threw his support behind a new resolution on Iraq.

"Japan supports the resolution submitted by the United States, Britain and Spain," AFP quoted Koizumi as addressing the Japanese parliament. 

"Unless the international community unites and puts pressure on Iraq, it will not cooperate with weapons inspections," Koizumi said, adding that he regarded the new resolution as part of ongoing efforts to “disarm Iraq.”

But French President Jacques Chirac, currently on a state visit to Algeria, reiterated that the work of United Nations weapons inspectors in the country should continue.

"The use of force can only be used as a last resort. There is an alternative to war,"

In the meantime, Russian President Vladimir Putin, on a visit to the Bulgarian capital city of Sofia, said he had been unable to sway Soviet-era ally and non-permanent Security Council member Bulgaria to drop its support for the U.S. hard line on Iraq.

His foreign minister Igor Ivanov meanwhile lobbied for "an exclusively peaceful solution in Iraq" in telephone calls to Security Council members including Pakistan, Mexico, Angola, Guinea, Cameroon and Chile.