Press Coverage

Calling a madman's number US News & World Report So Saddam is ready to play the old shell game of inspections again. Why not? The man's a master at it, after all–now you see it, now you don't. All that's really happened here is that the madman gambler is ready to gamble again. Will the world's political determination eventually fade in the face of Saddam's endless obfuscations? He aims to find out. Saddam's bet might be a good one with much of the world. It flat-out won't fly with George W. Bush. Now that it's...
The greater nuclear danger New York Times While the Bush administration has been pushing hard for military action to neutralize Iraq before it gets nuclear weapons, Washington has been moving much more slowly to eliminate an even more troubling nuclear threat - the vast array of bomb-grade materials that lie poorly protected around the world, waiting for some terrorist and rogue state to buy or steal them. Indeed, the only reason to fear that Saddam Hussein will have a nuclear arsenal any time soon is the possibility...
Blair's report warns New York Times London published a long-awaited report on Iraq on Tuesday, asserting that the regime of President Saddam Hussein was continuing to expand stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons and had plans to use them. Arguing for urgent action by the West, it said that some of the weapons could be deployed within 45 minutes. The 50-page document also supplied intelligence information that Iraq was trying to acquire materials abroad to build nuclear weapons and had extended the range of...
NPR All Things Considered - Terry Taylor NPR - All Things Considered - September 24th 2002 JOHN YDSTIE, host: Iraq wasted no time today responding to the British report. At a news conference in Baghdad just hours after it was released, Saddam Hussein's chief adviser, Amir Al-Saadi, said the dossier was long on allegations and short on evidence. He called it, quote, "a hodgepodge of half-truths, lies, shortsighted and naive allegations which will not stand up to an investigation." Al-Saadi also insisted United Nations...
BBC - Olivia Bosch - Iraq weapons inspections BBC - September 20th 2002 To watch the broadcast, click on the attachment at the bottom of the page. Iraq has told the UN it is ready to readmit weapons inspectors, four years after the last inspections were carried out there. The chief UN arms inspector, Hans Blix, has said he hopes to have an advance party in Iraq on 15 October. President Bush meets the Russian foreign minister, Igor Ivanov and defence minister, Sergei Ivanov, on Friday in an effort to win Russian acquiescence in his...
LA Weekly - Terence Taylor - A Big Threat LA Weekly - September 20th 2002 A Big Threat LAST WEEK THE INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR Strategic Studies (IISS), a London-based think tank, released its dossier, "Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction: A Net Assessment." The report reviews what is known about Iraq's chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs -- past, present and future. The evidence is, at times, scant and sketchy -- and this has led both those who support and those who oppose a war on Iraq to claim the report as...
NPR All Things Considered - Terence Taylor NPR - All Things Considered - September 19th 2002 One of the key dangers administration officials have focused on in recent weeks is that Saddam Hussein could obtain a nuclear weapon. Now a respected independent group in London has offered its own analysis of Iraq's nuclear program. The International Institute of Strategic Studies says Iraq still does not have the uranium to make a nuclear weapon, but the institute's Terry Taylor says Iraq does have hundreds of nuclear experts on its payroll....
BBC - Terence Taylor - The man from the UN BBC - September 18th 2002 Colonel Terry Taylor, a former UN inspector, spent six years investigating whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Despite denials and attempts to obstruct this work, the Iraqis eventually admitted to such a programme. "I went to Iraq to search for evidence of biological weapons. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack. We needed to track personnel, materials and equipment. What made it difficult was that the things we were looking for could be...
What has he got? London Review of Books ... The IISS assessment is an exemplary piece of work. It is clearly written and contains a full history both of the Iraqi programmes and of the UN inspectors' work in demolishing them. On the nuclear side ... it has an authoritative account of the Iraqi programme before and during the Gulf War which should be essential reading for anyone interested in the effectiveness or otherwise of nuclear safeguards. It also contains an account of the 'Crash' programme that Kamel...
Times - Olivia Bosch - Interview Times - September 17th 2002 As the UN's weapons inspectors prepare to return to Iraq, a former inspector from the mid-1990s describes how accountants are just as important as chemists in tracking down President Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. Olivia Bosch, now a Visiting Fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said today that military, chemical and biological experts were necessary on the team, but that accountants and auditors, as with the Enron...
Iraq: Is it about oil? BBC Online The Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz says that the threats against Iraq are really about oil. "The aim of the American policies is the oil in the Gulf" is how he puts it. Iraq is second only to Saudi Arabia in its oil reserves. According to the respected Platts Guide, it has proven reserves of 112 billion barrels, mostly in southern Iraq. Platts quoted the senior deputy Oil Minister, Taha Hmud, as saying in May 2002 that Iraq's reserves could amount to 300 billion...
Saddam shops for arms Sunday Telegraph The threat of invasion is spurring Iraq into a military shopping spree in an attempt to strengthen Saddam Hussein's hand before a United States-led military attack on his regime. US intelligence reports have indicated a series of contacts between Iraqi officials and underground arms networks across the world since President George W. Bush made it clear that the goal of his administration was regime change in Baghdad. Last week, the United Nations Security Council began debating...
A question of timing Sunday Times Apart from the predictable response by Saddam Hussein's underlings, there has been overwhelming support for the Iraq strategy set out by George Bush in his speech to the United Nations General Assembly last week. The proposal of setting a deadline for allowing the arms inspectors back into Iraq is backed by 95% of British people in our poll today. A vast majority - eight out of ten - also believe that if Saddam refuses or obstructs the inspectors, force could legitimately be used...
Let's have an explanation Independent on Sunday In the countdown to war, the focus shifts to the United Nations. This is progress of sorts. Last month, it appeared as if the divided US administration was heading for the worst option of all, a unilateral strike against Iraq with only Britain lending a helping hand. The more pragmatic figures around George Bush have prevailed in the short term, convincing him that he should appear to take the UN seriously. Whether the frantic diplomatic activity this weekend reflects a...
Confronting Iraq Economist TO HEAR his many critics tell it, George Bush had serious charges to answer this week before the United Nations court of international opinion. The leader of the free world stands accused of threatening to disrupt international law and order. America's insistence that Iraq be stripped of its illicit weapons of mass destruction, as a matter of urgency, by force if necessary, is anyway surely a ruse, since Mr Bush has publicly admitted his aim is to topple the regime of Saddam Hussein....
Iraq's arsenal Economist Perhaps The IISS's assessment Nuclear/radiological • Does not possess facilities to produce fissile material in sufficient amounts for nuclear weapons.• Would require at least several years and extensive foreign assistance to build such fissile material production facilities.• Could probably assemble nuclear weapons within months if fissile material from foreign sources were obtained.• Current interest in radiological weapons unknown. Could divert domestic...
Two last chances on Iraq Financial Times President George W. Bush this week in effect issued two ultimatums: one to Saddam Hussein and the other to the United Nations. Mr Bush told the UN General Assembly on Thursday the Security Council had failed in its obligation to enforce the dis-armament of Iraq, as much as the Baghdad regime had refused to meet its obligations by serially flouting council resolutions. The international authority that arose out of the ruins of the second world war and the wreckage of the League...
Document against Iraq gives little new data International Herald Tribune The White House has released a document as evidence that it is time to overthrow Saddam Hussein that summarizes his regime's abuses of Iraqis and its past use or possession of chemical and biological agents. But it contains little new information - and no bombshells - showing that Saddam is producing new weapons of mass destruction or has joined with terrorists to threaten the United States or its interests abroad. Administration officials, seeking to persuade the...
NPR Weekend Edition Saturday - John Chipman NPR - September 14th 2002 To hear the interview, click here (follow the link from this page) SCOTT SIMON, host: This week, a report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London assessed the Iraqi threat, and it has given new ammunition to both sides in the debate over Iraq. John Chipman is director of the institute and joins us from London. Mr. Chipman, thanks very much for being with us. Mr. JOHN CHIPMAN (Director, International Institute for Strategic Studies): Thank you...
White House spells out case CNN Report is titled 'A Decade of Deception and Defiance' WASHINGTON (CNN) -- As the Bush administration makes its strongest bid yet for international and domestic support for action against Iraq this week, the White House released a report early Thursday, listing some of the principal accusations against Iraq and its leader. Bush addressed the United Nations' General Assembly later in the morning on Thursday, saying, "The Security Council resolutions will be enforced. The just demands of...