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Ramadan: The
US has revealed its great animosity toward Arabs and Muslims |
BAGHDAD,
Feb. 10 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Iraq's Vice President Taha Yassin
Ramadan renewed Baghdad's offer Sunday to resume unconditional dialogue with
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.
"We
have shown our readiness for a useful and positive dialogue with the secretary
general and his organization, without preconditions," Ramadan told
reporters at the opening of a Syrian trade fair, AFP reported. "The two
parties are free to bring up (during this dialogue) what they judge to be
useful," he said.
Annan
said last week he would like to resume a substantive dialogue with Baghdad, but
added that the return of U.N. arms inspectors who pulled out of Iraq in December
1998 was not negotiable.
U.S.
Secretary of State Colin Powell, who said the United Nations should not engage
in a dialogue with Baghdad until it had readmitted the weapons inspectors,
reiterated this. "U.S. designs against Arab countries are well known to
Arabs," Ramadan said of Powell's comments, urging Arab states to "take
a serious step on the road to solidarity" during their Beirut summit
scheduled for end-March.
"The
United States has revealed its great animosity toward Arabs and Muslims. Arabs
must face up to these threats and not give more concessions to this arrogant
power which takes such concessions as a sign of weakness," Ramadan said.
Ramadan
rebuffed comments by Powell this week that U.S. President George W. Bush was
considering military action against Iraq in its so-called war on terrorism.
"America has been saying that over the last 12 years and those who defend
their sovereignty and country will defeat the aggressors such as the arrogant
Americans."
The
Bush administration is determined to force Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to let
U.N. weapons inspectors who have been kept out since 1998 back in and accuses
him of allegedly seeking to develop nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.
Bush said last month Iraq, Iran and North Korea formed an "axis of
evil" and the United States would act to prevent them developing nuclear,
chemical and biological weapons.
Various
options, apart from a military decision, are available to the administration,
which had an official policy of "regime change" in Baghdad even before
the September 11 attacks on the United States put countries that it calls
sponsors of terrorism more firmly at the top of Bush's potential target list.
In
a reply to Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit's request that Iraq allow U.N.
inspectors into the country, Saddam said in a letter this week that Iraq had no
weapons of mass destruction and urged Ankara to oppose U.S. threats against
Iraq.
Ramadan
said Iraq's Foreign Minister Naji Sabri would travel to Ankara this week to
attend a joint meeting of the Islamic Conference Organization and the European
Union. "It is a routine visit. We have to explain to officials all the
dimensions of the problem and the hidden agenda of the enemy (against
Iraq)."
