*EPF404 09/12/2002
Republican Senator Backs President Bush on Iraqi Threat
(Senator Sessions warns of Baghdad's weapons of mass destruction) (530)

By Steve LaRocque
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington - Senator Jeff Sessions (Republican of Alabama) warned in a September 10 speech in the U.S. Senate that an Iraq with weapons of mass destruction working with terrorists who would willingly use such weapons against innocent civilians represents a grave threat to the United States.

Sessions, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee, said there were terrorist groups and cells "throughout the country," and that there are people who "believe they have a right to use terrorism and weapons of mass destruction to kill and maim people who have done nothing in their lives to wrong them."

Sessions added that President Bush has spoken on the problem posed by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. "It is a problem that will not go away," Sessions said, because the Baghdad regime has been in "continual violation" of agreements not to develop weapons of mass destruction.

"The gravity of the problem is clear," the Alabama Republican said.

He said Iraqi ruler Saddam Hussein's violations of United Nations resolutions and agreements at the end of the Gulf War "are matters of life and death."

Hussein, he added, "has, with determination and consistency for many years before the Gulf War ... persisted" in developing weapons "that he has used."

The Iraqi dictator's actions, Sessions continued, "demonstrate not just technical infringements" on agreements Baghdad has made, but constitute "a deliberate and determined program to develop weapons of mass destruction that he himself can use if he desires, or he can, in secret, provide to stateless terrorists so they can use these weapons on law-abiding American citizens and people of the world."

The danger is real, he emphasized.

"We are in a critical time right now," Sessions said, "I think the President has done the right thing, to say he wants Congress to participate in a debate and to give him a resolution of support of his action with regard to Iraq."

At the conclusion of the Gulf War in 1991, Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, Sessions said, "agreed to reject weapons of mass destruction, chemical and biological weapons."

Furthermore, Sessions said, Saddam Hussein agreed that United Nations inspectors "could be sent there to actually go into his country and examine anything that looked unusual, he would not attempt to stop that, and we could send inspectors to prove he was not participating in weapons of mass destruction--chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons."

But what happened was very different, Saddam Hussein "has broken virtually every one of the promises he made," Sessions said.

"We have been dealing with this man and his deliberate plans to obtain weapons of mass destruction for quite a number of years, and virtually daily since the Gulf War," he said.

Hussein, Sessions said, "had no intention of complying with the world's demands to stop. He will not stop."

Sessions asked his fellow lawmakers if any of them thought Saddam Hussein would "stop his activities" to build weapons of mass destruction.

He noted how in a "Sense of The Congress" resolution regarding U.S. policy toward Baghdad, it was declared, "It should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime."

(The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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