*EPF306 10/06/2004
Chief U.S. Inspector Says Hussein Sought to Break Sanctions
(Congressional Report, October 6: Iraq Survey Group Report) (600)

Washington -- Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was aggressively plotting to subvert U.N. sanctions as part of a plan to produce illicit nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, according to the chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq.

Hussein was actively pursuing illegal financing and procurement efforts to undermine U.N.-imposed sanctions that prevented him from reconstituting weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs after the 1991 Persian Gulf War, Chief Inspector Charles A. Duelfer testified October 6 before the Senate Armed Services Committee. That effort included influencing certain permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, he said.

"The fact that [Hussein] had the intent and capability, and that he was trying to undermine the sanctions that were in place is very disturbing," White House press secretary Scott McClellan told the Washington Post October 6. "And I think the report will continue to show that he was a gathering threat that needed to be taken seriously, that it was a matter of time before he was going to begin pursuing those weapons of mass destruction."

The Senate Armed Services Committee was hearing testimony from Duelfer and Marine Brigadier General Joseph J. McMenamin, commander of the Iraq Survey Group, following release of the survey group's final weapons inspection report.

Duelfer said that the U.N.-imposed sanctions program was eroding and that there was a lot of corruption.

The Iraq Survey Group -- a special joint weapons inspection team from the CIA and the Defense Department -- did uncover Iraqi plans for ballistic missiles with ranges from 400 to 1,000 kilometers and for a 1,000-kilometer-range cruise missile, which were all farther than the 150-kilometer range permitted by the United Nations, Duelfer said.

Duelfer testified that Hussein wanted to produce illicit weapons, but did not have the means to produce them by the time of the 2003 U.S.-led Iraq war that toppled Hussein's regime. He also testified that after extensive investigations the prospects of finding an illicit weapons stockpile now is less than 5 percent, although an examination of a huge number of captured files and documents is still under way.

He said Hussein tried to retain the intellectual capability to produce a nuclear weapons program after 1991, but Duelfer's inspectors did not find an active program.

"We found no evidence, nor do we judge that there was one," Duelfer said.

However, Duelfer testified that he believed the world is better off since Saddam Hussein's regime has been deposed and Hussein is in custody.

"Analytically, the world is better off," Duelfer testified.

Duelfer, under committee questioning, said that his investigators have not found evidence of an active mobile biological weapons program. He said two trailers found in May 2003 -- one in Irbil and the other in Mosul -- were designed for the production of hydrogen.

"They have absolutely nothing to do with any biological weapons," Duelfer testified.

However, he added "this is one of those issues where I'm not quite comfortable in pronouncing that there was no mobile system in Iraq. We believe we've done as much investigation as we can. We have found no evidence."

Duelfer replaced David A. Kay in January as the chief U.S. weapons inspector after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Duelfer is formally the special adviser to the director of Central Intelligence for strategy regarding Iraqi weapons of mass destruction programs. As head of the Iraq Survey Group he worked independently of the CIA and the Pentagon.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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