Hawks widen net of suspect states
Guardian,Tuesday November 20, 2001
Hawks in the US administration stepped up pressure on President Saddam Hussein, yesterday by claiming he may have covertly developed biological weapons in the past three years.
John Bolton, the under-secretary for arms control and international security, told an arms conference in Geneva that he suspected Iraq had "developed, produced and stockpiled biological warfare agents and weapons", taking advantage of the absence of UN weapons inspectors since 1998.
Meanwhile, Arab countries yesterday warned the US against attacking them.
Amr Moussa, secretary general of the Arab League, which represents most Arab states, said in Cairo that there was "a common Arab position that has been very clearly declared and conveyed to whoever it may concern regarding strikes against any Arab country".
With the war in Afghanistan progressing faster than Washington had expected, the debate between the hawks and doves in the US government on whether Iraq should be the next target is hotting up.
Mr Bolton, a rightwinger, lines up with the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, and his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, in favouring action against Iraq.
The national security ad viser, Condoleezza Rice, is tilting towards the hawks, while the secretary of state, Colin Powell, remains opposed.
The conference was discussing the 1972 biological weapons treaty.
Before the September 11 attacks and the distribution of anthrax letters, the US surprised the international community by rejecting proposals to tighten up checks on biological weapons. Mr Bolton said they would not have prevented the anthrax attacks.
He told the conference: "The [US] strongly suspects that Iraq has taken advantage of three years of no UN inspections to improve all phases of its offensive biological weapons programme. The existence of Iraq's programme is beyond dispute."
The inspectors left Iraq in 1998, after a series of rows in which Iraq claimed it had cooperated in showing all its facilities, in anticipation of a US-British bombing raid on suspect sites.
Since no significant link between Iraq and Osama bin Laden have been established, the suspected development of biological weapons could give the US hawks a reason for military action.
Mr Bolton said the US believed that North Korea was making a a dedicated effort to produce biological weapons, and was "quite concerned" about Iran, Libya, Syria and Sudan, which appeared to have programmes.
"There are other states I could have named which the [US] will be contacting privately concerning our belief that they are pursuing an offensive biological weapons programme," he added.
