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Today's News from the U.N. and the World, visit: MaximsNews® LLC MaximsNews@MaximsNews.com Established 1999. MaximsNews® LLC News Network Reaching Over 10,000 in the International Community, now in association with MediaChannel.org and Globalvision News Network, global news and media information services with more than 300 news affiliates in 135 countries Hans Blix is Available for Media Interviews: HansBlix@MaximsNews.com
MaximsNews Columnist
Publisher's Note:
To read excerpts and to purchase his book, Disarming
Iraq, please visit: http://www.maximsnews.com/hansblix22march2004.htm.
Dr
Blix contributed this column to www.MaximsNews.com;
he delivered it earlier as a speech in New
Delhi on 16 March 2005, India International
Centre. This is the full text, as delivered.
WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION: CHALLENGES
AHEAD By
Hans Blix What
are the challenges ahead posed by weapons of
mass destruction? During
the Cold War we worried about a possible
nuclear duel, in which the US and the Soviet
Union would achieve a mutually assured
destruction –
MAD – and the rest of the world
might be wiped out as “collateral
damage.” After
the end of the Cold War and the arrival of détente
in the early 1990s
we do not think such a duel is
likely. What would they fight about? The
approach to global security has changed
dramatically since the end of the Cold War
and the very concept of security is
gradually being perceived in a different,
generally much broader, manner. A high level panel appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan argues in its recent report on ‘a more secure world’ that global security must mean more than the security of states against armed attacks. It must mean also security of people against oppression, civil war, hunger, global disease and environmental disasters. I agree with this view and the role of the UN to help provide such security. Personally I am as concerned about the long term global environmental threats to man’s security, notably global warming, as I am about the short and medium term threats posed by WMDs – whether in the hands of non-state actors or governments. It leads me strongly to support the expanded use of nuclear power for electricity generation and – in years to come – for the production of hydrogen to supplement and replace oil as fuel.. However,
as the Chairman of an international
Commission on Weapons of Mass Destruction,
which has met in the last few days here in
New Delhi and which hopes to present a
report early next year, I certainly
recognize the relevance of the threats of
WMD and the acute need to counter them –
whether they are in the hands of non-state
actors, so called ‘rogue states’, or
other states.
The
use of force between states: are there any
legal restraints? Clearly
there have always been restraints on the use
of armed force caused by concern about costs
in lives and money by the fear that force
might fail, that serious retaliation would
be taken. However, I am asking what
restraints – if any – there might be in
rules governing states. I shall not tire you
with a lecture on the many theories of just war. In the past they mostly remained theories. Machiavelli
(1492-1550), as one might expect, was fairly
forthright on the subject. He said simply
that “that
war is just which is necessary and every
sovereign entity may decide on the occasion
for war.” [Brownlie, p. 11] Nevertheless
in the 19th and 20th
centuries, with states coming closer to each
other, the thought of collective
security becomes more intense and in
1945 in Art. 2:4 of the UN Charter it is
agreed that members must not use force
against the territorial integrity and
political independence of any state. The
Security Council is to intervene – if need
be with military force – to stop threats
or breaches of the peace. However, the
‘inherent’ right of individual and
collective self defense remains, when an
armed occurs until the Council has taken
then necessary measures. (Art. 51) Did it
work out? Sadly,
during
the cold war the collective security
system of the UN Charter was mostly
inoperative. Actions could be prevented by
the
veto. States had to find their security
not through the UN but through the right to individual or collective self-defense, through alliances,
non-alignment or neutrality. The
end of Communism brought détente and a new
security situation After
the end of the Cold War and the collapse
of Communism the security situation has
changed drastically. There is continued détente
between all big powers.
There are no significant territorial
or ideological conflicts between them. The
veto is by no means automatic. The most important joint UN action made possible by the climate of détente was, of course, the authorization given to the broad alliance created by President Bush the elder to intervene in 1991 to stop Iraq’s naked aggression against and occupation of Kuwait. For some time the action gave hope to the world that a new will of governments to cooperate would at long last bring the collective security system of the Charter to life. The
discoveries in Iraq in 1991 undermined the
confidence in the NPT Through
the UN authorized intervention in Iraq we
discovered what détente, cooperation and
the notion of collective security could
achieve. However, through the IAEA
inspectors, who went into Iraq after the
cease-fire the world also discovered that
Iraq, a state which is a party to the
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and has thus
committed itself not to acquire nuclear
weapons had, in fact, an advanced program
for the enrichment of uranium and for the
production of nuclear weapons. Later, UNSCOM
inspectors brought evidence of a significant
program for biological weapons and even of
the testing of B-weapons. These
discoveries could not but shake the confidence in the reliability of the NPT and the safeguards
verification system, which was meant to
deter from illicit nuclear activities and
detect cheating. When, in the same period,
the earliest IAEA inspectors in North Korea
concluded that the DPRK
had not declared all the plutonium it had
produced, the question was inevitably asked
whether the NPT was like the proverbial
Swiss cheese full of holes. Was the world
being lulled into false confidence? Work
started to bring about a significant
strengthening of the IAEA safeguards
inspections – efforts that led in 1997 to
the adoption of new protocols for much more
effective inspection. Nevertheless,
the events seem to have weakened the US
dedication to and reliance on global arms
control agreements and given rise to ideas
about a policy of more active unilateral counter-proliferation. The concept was not – and is not –
terribly well defined but it certainly
comprised options of use of force - special armed operations. The Israeli bombing
raid destroying the OSIRAK
reactor in Iraq in 1981 is the example that
comes to mind. The
many years during which Saddam Hussein was
able to play cat
and mouse with UN inspectors presumably
further eroded
the US confidence that international
economic sanctions and inspection would
bring credible assurance about the absence
of any weapons of mass destruction. Although before 11 September 2001 Iraq was certainly not seen by the US as a nuclear threat, nevertheless, to the US, Saddam’s cat & mouse play suggested the existence of weapons and he appeared as an intolerable defiance. The temptation to go from containing him to replacing him was there. Regime change was desired but there was no clear casus belli. How
did the non-existent WMDs become the casus
belli? We now know that in all likelihood Iraq in fact destroyed most weapons of mass destruction – but not all relevant infrastructure -- in the summer of 1991. Yet, Iraq behaved as if it might still have prohibited weapons contributing to a US wish for regim change. Why? There might have been several reasons. · For one thing, Saddam would often hear that sanctions would not be lifted unless he, himself, disappeared. This could not have given him much incentive to cooperate. He could just as well be obstructive. · Secondly, Iraq knew that UNSCOM teams often comprised “experts” seconded from national intelligence organizations and reporting not to the UN but to these organizations. It cannot have stimulated the will to cooperation. ·
Thirdly, just as you may scare
people from your house by hanging a sign
reading “beware of dog” without having a
dog Saddam Hussein might have wanted to
scare Iran and others in the region and to
stand tall and dangerous in the Arab
world… Regardless of what might have been the most important reason for the difficulties raised in the 1990s against the inspectors, in 2002 the US and the world suspected that the Iraqi conduct was linked to the existence of hidden WMDs. The
suspicions were nourished by Iraqi
defectors, who wished to see US military
intervention – not UN inspection. The
arguments for armed action may well have
varied a great deal: stationing of US troops
in Iraq could be less problematic than in
Saudi Arabia and could be useful as a
pressure upon Iran. The oil supplies of Iraq
were vast and important for future US
imports. However, these were not good public
reasons for going to war. Today hopes for
democracy - in which we all share - are said
to justify the war. Such hopes would not
have brought assent by the US Congress/UK
parliament to war. Instead weak evidence of
WMD and links to terrorists were spun into
virtual reality. I
am glad to say that the international
inspectors remained professional and never
abandoned critical thinking. The book I have
written Disarming
Iraq has also stayed on the non-fiction
list. It
appears that some in the US leadership had
become so convinced of their own arguments
about WMDs that they believed the inspectors
were lying and arranged to have me bugged. I
only wish that once they were at this they
had listened better to what I said… While the US chose to ignore that UN inspections did not confirm US allegations other members of the Security Council did not ignore what we said. They concluded that the inspections worked and should continue. What was the hurry to use force? Despite tremendous pressure they stood fast. What would the world have thought of the Council today if it had authorized the war in March 2003? For that matter, what would the world have thought of international inspection, if we had endorsed the intelligence that claimed the existence of WMDs? The
unleashing of the war. The lack of
justifications The
official legal justifications of the war
have been that Iraq had violated a number of
resolutions of the Security Council and that
action was taken to “uphold the authority
of the Council”. However, it seems strange
that individual members of the Council could
have the right to uphold an authority that
the majority does not want to exercise. The
main political justification of the war was
that Iraq had illegally retained weapons of
mass destruction and that these constituted
a threat to the US, the UK and the world.
However, the closer we got to the day of
unleashing the armed action, the weaker, the
less credible the evidence looked. A
contract between Iraq and Niger, for the
import of uranium oxide and mentioned by
President Bush in his state of the Union
message, was shown to have been a forgery… The war was unleashed without any authorization by the Security Council and the world. A counter-proliferation action was undertaken to identify and eliminate WMDs -- which did not exist. It is hard to resist the reflection that in terms of lives and suffering, property and money the war was a very costly way of concluding that there were no WMDs. The
impact of the Iraq invasion on the
collective security system of the UN From
the viewpoint of the collective security
system of the UN Charter, the extent to
which the United States has claimed that it
is free to take armed action is worrisome.
Article 51 of the UN Charter recognizes the
right to self-defense “when an armed
attack occurs” but the US national
security doctrine 2002 has explained that in
the era of weapons of mass destruction, long
range missiles and terrorist groups, it
feels at liberty to take armed action in ‘anticipatory
self-defense’ not
only where it deems an attack “imminent”
but also– as President Bush has said
repeatedly –
where it sees a
“a
growing threat”.
What is a
‘growing danger?’ There are two crucial problems with the claim of a right to such anticipatory self-defense: · Before an attack has taken place or is manifest, the knowledge about it is likely to depend upon intelligence. The Iraq affair does not give much confidence about national intelligence as a reliable basis for decision-making. Where it turns out that the basis is erroneous, then what is meant to be anticipatory self-defense may become a totally unjustified attack. ·
While “imminence”
may be a severe time requirement, “a growing
threat” would be an unacceptably lax
criterion. It
has been suggested that in the current
review of the functioning of the UN an
effort should be made to reformulate article 51 of the Charter to give some room for
preemptive action. The high level panel that
has recently reported to Kofi Annan rejected
the idea and warned that any widening of the
right to self defense would be open to abuse
by all states. I
agree with this view. It is more likely that
an answer to the question when unilaterally
decided self-defense is acceptable to the
world community will slowly emerge through precedents. Even
if the further development in Iraq and the
Middle East were to be positive for peace,
human rights, democracy and economics, as we
all fervently hope, I do not think that the
invasion of Iraq two years ago, mainly
justified by an urgent need to eradicate
weapons of mass destruction, which turned
out not to exist, will be seen by the world
at large as an acceptable precedent to build
on. In current public US debate – re Iran and DPRK we do not see the slightest concern that US military attacks could be incompatible with Art. 51 – the right to self-defense when an armed attack occurs. We see concern only about what military or political consequences a US attack could have. We must ask then whether the very construction or existence of installations, which may produce highly enriched uranium or plutonium, constitute “an attack” on the United States justifying armed action in self –defense without any authorization by the Security Council. Or, do such installations constitute “growing threats”, which are held to be equivalent to “armed attacks”? For
the future, Kofi Annan has wisely noted that
governments will be less likely to take
action unilaterally and be more likely to
turn to Security Council for joint action to
consider and address threats, which are not
imminent, if they are confident that
threats they perceive will be seriously
examined with a readiness for action,
where the evidence is found convincing and
the threat is seen as significant and near
in time. We should note that the Council can
authorize action – even armed action --
not only where there is an “armed
attack”, but in any situation where it
deems there has been a threat to the peace
or breach of the peace. Let
me conclude this discussion by noting that
there is now much support for the view that
the Security Council should be ready to
authorize international action – in the
last resort armed interventions – not only
to bring an end to direct aggression and
other military threats but also to
stop the most egregious violations of human
rights, like the genocides in Cambodia
or Rwanda or the atrocities in Darfur. We
have come a very long way from the time when
the former regime in South Africa argued
that the apartheid system was an internal
matter that the UN could not even discuss. Weapons
of mass destruction I
turn now from the broad question of legal
limitations on the use of force to the some
broad questions regarding weapons of mass
destruction. With
the arrival of the nuclear weapons
governments concluded that a ban
on use was not enough. The safest would
be to eradicate them. No weapons – no use!
The recipe laid down in the
Non-Proliferation treaty of 1968 was a double bargain under which non-nuclear weapon states committed
themselves not to acquire the weapons and
the nuclear weapon states committed
themselves together with all other parties
to negotiate toward nuclear – and general
-- disarmament. However,
while a breach of a ban on use is visible,
breach of a ban on the possession of a type
of weapons might not be. To deter and to detect violations– inspection
-- is needed. The question arises how
intrusive inspection states will tolerate
and what degree of confidence inspection
must give. The
inspection system – safeguards – agreed
by states in 1970s and operated by IAEA –
was not very intrusive – inspected
only declared installations. Did not spot
Iraq’s enrichment program. This gave rise
in ‘90s to US counterproliferation
doctrine. Israeli example 1981. You
might perhaps say that regime change in Iraq
through war in 2003 was a
muscular application of the doctrine of
counter-proliferation including use of
force. Muscular
application requires muscle and this is
undoubtedly what the US continues to
develop. In this respect Europe and the US
are not marching in step. Recently, the
outgoing US ambassador to NATO complained
that defense spending of Europe’s NATO
members was only 1.9 % of their GDP – or
$221 billion – compared to the US’s 3.7
% of GDP.
(Fi.T. 3 March 2005).
In the US huge sums are spent on the
“shield” and may come to be spent on new
types of nuclear weapons – items not on
European military budgets. The
Europeans, while fully aware of the
persistence of regional controversies and
terrorist threats, find it hard to
understand why during unprecedented global détente
between the great powers there should not
also be disarmament and less military
spending. They feel you do not have much use
nuclear weapons to bomb terrorists or even
‘rogue’ states. They do not deny that
diplomacy often needs to be backed by
military strength but they are anxious to
use diplomacy, to continue building an
international order based on common rules
and to increase the effectiveness of the international regimes, including the UN and various disarmament regimes rather than showing them contempt. It is too early to know whether the US administration will continue to deemphasize or even discount international arms control and disarmament treaties and international inspection. Important tests are coming up. Should the US resume development of new nuclear weapons – and perhaps test them – I think it is likely that some other states will do the same. We might have a new arms race. If, one the other hand, the US should ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, I think it is likely that China would also ratify. If China ratified, I think India would; if India did, I think Pakistan would, etc. Depending on which direction the domino brick falls there may be disarmament or there may be arms races. If India and other states were to declare loud and clear that they will ratify the treaty if the US does it, it might help to build up momentum for bringing the treaty into operation. The
value of international inspection I
have tried to show how a skeptic attitude to
the effectiveness of current international
inspection is a part of a US skeptic
attitude to arms control and disarmament
regimes and part of the inclination to rely
on military muscle. The negative attitude to
international inspection sometimes strains
credibility, notably regarding a
comprehensive nuclear test ban. But also
regarding a treaty on the prohibition of
production of fissile material for weapons
purposes. (The
FMCT.) In
the case of Iraq, UNMOVIC carried out 700
inspections of 500 sites, including several
dozens inspections of sites suggested by
intelligence agencies. We did not uncover
any “smoking gun” and US/UK evidence was
increasingly rebutted. Yet the US and the UK
preferred to believe in faith-based
intelligence and launched the war. One
would hope that the Iraq war, although
illegal in the view of most international
lawyers, will bring some good results.
It cost many thousands of lives,
enormous destruction and financial expense.
Continued international inspection would
probably have led to continued containment
of Iraq and Saddam. It would have carried
the modest cost of some $ 80 million/year
and required only 200 – 300 UN staff. It
must be admitted that while international
inspection could – and did –rebut or
cast doubt on much evidence presented by the
US and the UK, it was not able to certify
that there were absolutely no weapons. Alas,
not even occupation seems able to get that
far. A
problem for all international inspection –
even for an occupier and for the
states submitted to inspection -- is
that one cannot
prove the negative. Naturally, the more
effective inspection is, the more likely it
is that finding no violations is due to
there being no violations. Nevertheless, a
small residue of uncertainty remains even
after effective inspection.
In
the last report that I submitted on behalf
of the IAEA, which I still headed in 1997, I
wrote that “Some
uncertainty is inevitable in any
country-wide technical verification process
which aims to prove the absence of readily
concealable objects or activities. The
extent to which such uncertainty is
acceptable is
a policy judgment.” (UN Doc.
S/1997/779, para. 89). Many
lessons can to be drawn from the Iraq
affair. One is that independent
professional international inspectors
with the right to very intrusive inspections
while not able to prove the negative, came
much closer
to seeing the truth than national
intelligence. National intelligence is indispensable, not least in times of terrorism, but it must apply critical thinking. It has enormous resources and can get access to information, which is not accessible to international inspectors. President
Reagan once famously stated ‘trust but
verify’. In the last decade, the US
authorities seem to have come to the
position: don’t trust and don’t verify
– at least not through international
inspections. I submit that the experiences
from Iraq should lead to some second
thoughts.
International inspectors have legal
access to installations, facilities, which
may not be accessible to intelligence, and
they may bring information that intelligence
cannot produce. Hence, professional international inspection with extensive rights of access, supported, but not remote-controlled, by intelligence, may be the best recipe. How
is the world to meet the threats and actions
of terrorist groups? The
first point to make, I think, is that
terrorists do not live on clouds but must
have their feet on the territory of states.
It is important that the international
community upholds the principle that each
government is obliged to ensure that its
territory is not used as a base for
attacks on other states. It is legally
correct and practically and politically
sound. If there is a failure in this duty,
then the Security Council will endorse
forcible intervention – as it did with the
Taliban government in Afghanistan. Second,
broad international efforts to ensure the safe
keeping of nuclear and other dangerous
material and equipment everywhere in the
world are important to reduce the
availability of such material and equipment.
If the Pakistan government had exercised
better control of its nuclear sector, Mr.
Khan’s shop for nuclear weapon designs and
centrifuges would not have been in its
dangerous business. Most
of the measures, which governments need to
take to reduce the risk of terrorists
wielding ‘dirty bombs’ biological or
chemical weapons are needed also to protect
their own public against radiation, the
release of bacteria or viruses or the
dangers of various chemicals. There is much
international cooperation in the field of
radiation protection and in the prevention
of trafficking in nuclear material and
equipment. Similar efforts could be
undertaken in the biological field, for
instance, the elaboration of model
legislation and model administrative
routines. The WHO, as well as individual
states could be of help. Third,
what is mostly needed immediately is
intensified international
cooperation in the day-to-day field –
work of the national intelligence, police
and financial institutions of states to
trace persons, resources, weapons and
dangerous material. One
of the purposes claimed for the military invasion of Iraq
was to prevent the promotion of Al Qaeda and
other terrorists groups, allegedly supported
by Iraq. If this was really an aim, it was
one that failed singularly.
It is evident that the occupation has
prompted and stimulated
terrorism and that harsh and illegal
response measures, in this case as in
similar cases –
at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo as in
Chechnya – breed further terrorism and
risks driving large numbers of civilians,
otherwise not favourable to the extremists,
to support them. Fourth,
after a 9/11 or a Beslan massacre the mood
is simply to punish
the perpetrators and to eradicate the
responsible group.
Yet, for the longer term it is
rational to ask why
the terrorists commit such atrocities.
To be sure,
motives may be muddled or absurd.
However, if reasonable non-armed measures
can be taken, which reduce incentives to
terrorism, they should be on the agenda,
whether they are in the fields of economic
or social development or greater autonomy
for particular groups or regions. I agree with Tony Blair who said that nothing would do more to reduce terrorism in the Middle East than a solution to the Israeli – Palestinian problem. States
and WMDs Even
though there is concern that terrorist
groups may get hold of and employ nuclear
weapons, the concern is much greater about nuclear
weapons in the hands of states. Indeed,
one might sometimes get the impression that
the world is milling with states eager to
get these weapons. There is talk about
‘cascades’ of states ready to go for
nuclear weapons. I think the situation is
serious enough without any need for hyping
and headlines. At least in the short and
medium term I believe there are only the
“usual suspects”. Iraq and Libya were
among them but are out of action. So there
remain Iran and North Korea. Any other?
Syria? No. Saudi Arabia? No? Byelorussia?
No. Risk for domino effects in East Asia if
North Korea moved on? Yes. How
should the world community tackle these
questions? As
states invariably are influenced by what
they see as perceived security interests
when they look for nuclear weapons it is
obvious that foreign and security policies
which solve conflicts and dissolve
tensions globally and regionally are
vital. They remove the incentives for
weapons. But
they often take time and meanwhile other
measures are needed. It
is Iran
and North Korea (DPRK) that today make
us hold our breath.. Both countries have
acted in disregard of their safeguards
obligations. In
both cases a number of states are at the
present time seeking solutions through
negotiations. This is welcome. The war
that was waged in
Iraq is not a model that many want to see followed. It is a mistake to think that the two countries are asked simply to respect obligations they have already undertaken; that it would be just rewarding breaches to offer them anything. They are, in fact, asked to forego technical developments, which are permitted but which, if they were continued, would create tension and could be used to make weapons. Let
me note that three other non-nuclear weapon
states parties to the NPT are not asked to
forego their enrichment capacity: Brazil,
Japan and South Africa The
DPRK and IRAN are asked to forego all
nuclear activities through which bomb grade
material could be produced and to accept far-reaching
verification. The minimum in this regard
would be full acceptance of the additional
safeguards agreements of the IAEA.
To induce them to make such
commitments will require some attractive
quid pro quo. It
is my belief that both in the case of Iran
and the case of the DPRK some guarantees
may need to be given about security
against attacks from the outside. The DPRK
has talked explicitly about a
“non-aggression pact” but the substance
is more important than the form. It is
encouraging that there seems to have been
some positive responses from the US side in
the case of the DPRK. As
regards the DPRK
I submit it might be wise to make the economic
part of the package attractive by
constructing it in a way that would help the
country to gradually
exit without implosion from the system
that has brought it to misery and
starvation. As
regards Iran,
let me first say that in my view it is not
surprising that many countries in the world
have suspected Iran of intending to move to
nuclear weapons.
Iran built infrastructure for the
enrichment of uranium disregarding express
obligations under its safeguards agreement
with the IAEA. Although Iran assures the
world that it intends to enrich uranium only
to the level needed for its own power
reactor fuel, it could
later go to a concentration needed for
weapons. Iran has further engaged in
building a large heavy water research
reactor – a type of reactor deemed
convenient for the production of plutonium,
provided that a reprocessing capacity is
available. This does not seem to be the case
at the present time – at any rate not at
an industrial scale. This
is not, however, a full picture of the
Iranian issue. It has been said by some
critics that there is no justification for
Iran as an
oil rich country to build nuclear power
plants. This, I think, is almost a
colonialist argument. Why should not an oil
rich country produce electricity by nuclear
power and sell the oil it thereby saves for
good income in the world market? The
argument was never advanced against Mexico,
nor was it advanced when the Shah was still
in Iran and the US and other states competed
with each other to sell nuclear
infrastructure to the country. The
economic part of an agreement with Iran will need to cover trade and investment relations, perhaps
support for WTO membership. Such chips seem,
indeed, to on the table as do some
multilateral assurance of supply of uranium
fuel at market prices for its civilian power
reactors. The diplomatic game is on – which is better than off. But time is running. The
way forward This brings me to the end. I
confess I see dangers on the road
traveled in the last few years by the US
administration. Further exploration of new
types of American nuclear weapons will
not, I think, induce others to disarm and to
renounce weapons options that are
technically open to them. There may be more
weapons and conflicts rather than less
down this road. By
contrast, a resumption
of the kind of leadership that the US used
to exercise in the arms control and disarmament
fields would, I think, be greeted with enthusiasm
by the whole world and could lead all
away from WMDs and toward greater
security. We would like to see the US again
in the role of a lead wolf rather
than the lone wolf is
has been lately. · In such efforts more attention should be devoted to solving the political/security problems that almost invariably underlie the development or acquisition of WMDs; · Nothing would have a more positive effect than US ratification of a comprehensive test ban treaty. Likely to have a positive domino effect, including China, India, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq and Israel. It would make the development of new types of nuclear weapons much more difficult. Continued non-ratification has potentially high costs. · The conclusion of a verified cut off of the production of fissionable material for weapons combined with agreements on reductions in the number of weapons would gradually reduce the deadly arsenals. ·
A greater reliance on
independent and professional international inspection with broad rights to access on the ground
and with some intelligence supplied by
national authorities, would give
governments, governing boards and the
Security Council unbiased assessments.
UNMOVIC, which I headed, might be given
further or new functions by the Security
Council in the Council’s proposed stronger
engagement to counter WMDs.
For instance, as a subsidiary body of
the Council perhaps it could perform inspections in the fields of biological weapons and missiles, where
no inspection mechanisms exist. · As someone who was earlier responsible for international verification and inspection, let me end by saying that in foreign affairs, as in medicine, successful operations require correct diagnoses. Such diagnoses must have regard to real reality. They must not aim at creating a virtual reality to pull the public by the nose.
Hans Blix is Available for Media Interviews: HansBlix@MaximsNews.com
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