http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990106/V000427-010699-idx.html
Annan: Arms Inspectors Helped U.S.
Wednesday, January 6, 1999;
7:41 a.m. EST
WASHINGTON (AP) -- United Nations weapons inspectors may have been
used to help collect sensitive Iraqi communications for U.S. efforts
to undermine Saddam Hussein's regime, according to published reports.
The Boston Globe and The Washington Post quoted anonymous sources in
today's editions as saying the electronic eavesdropping operation
allowed U.S. intelligence agents to listen in on secret communications
among military units responsible for the Iraqi leader's safety.
The Post quoted confidants close to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi
Annan as saying he is convinced Washington used the operation to
penetrate the security apparatus protecting Saddam.
However, the Los Angeles Times reported today that Annan has told key
staff members he has no knowledge of the activities alleged by the Post.
``The secretary-general has become aware of the fact that UNSCOM directly
facilitated the creation of an intelligence collection system for the
United States in violation of its mandate,'' one Annan adviser told the Post.
``The United Nations cannot be party to an operation to overthrow
one of its member states. In the most fundamental way, that is what's wrong
with the UNSCOM operation.''
Annan accumulated enough evidence on the eavesdropping, some
through intermediaries passing on classified U.S. information, to ask
Richard Butler, head of the weapons inspection team, about the reports
last month, the Post said.
According to two of the confidants, Butler denied them to Annan. The
newspaper quoted some Annan advisers as acknowledging that Annan
would like to pressure Butler to resign in favor of a replacement who
might win the consent of Iraq and its defenders on the U.N. Security Council.
The Globe quoted former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter, a former
U.S. Marine, as saying, ``We knew a hell of a lot of information about
presidential security.'' But Ritter said if his team found any
information related to Hussein's personal safety, ``we would dump it.''
``Anything we did, we did on our own initiative,'' Ritter said on NBC's
``Today.'' ``The United Nations was in total control.'' His inspection
team, Ritter added, ``was not a party to any effort to overthrow the
president of Iraq.''
The Globe said the surveillance equipment allowed U.N. inspectors
to listen in on radio, cell phone and walkie-talkie communications by members
of the Iraqi security network.
The Globe said Rolf Ekeus, former executive chairman of UNSCOM,
declined to discuss operational elements of the system, but said the
program was run and controlled by the United Nations inspectors, not
the United States.
Ritter told the Globe that changed in March 1998 when the United
States pressured British and Israeli intelligence to stop supporting the
U.N. eavesdropping operation and took it over itself.
``The U.S. decided this system is too sensitive to be run by UNSCOM,''
Ritter told the paper. ``They bulled their way in and took it over. Now
any data collected by the activity is not being assessed by UNSCOM. Now,
the U.S. gained 100 percent access and is not feeding any of it back.''
``A number of member states have assisted UNSCOM in various aspects
of its work, and one of those is the United States,'' Butler told the
Post Tuesday night. ``But as far as I am concerned I have always been
assiduous in insisting that any assistance given to us be strictly related
to our disarmament mandate. I have never approved of any
assistance to any member state which would serve their unilateral purpose.''
While Annan acknowledges that the eavesdropping operation was meant in
part to aid inspectors looking for weapons of mass destruction, he also
believes UNSCOM enabled the United States to listen in on some of the
most sensitive communications of the Baghdad regime, his
confidants told the Post.
A Clinton administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity,
told the Post, ``We've already established that Saddam's personal
security apparatus and the apparatus that conceals weapons of mass
destruction are one and the same.'' Distinguishing between
them would be impossible for intelligence-gathering efforts, he added.
The CIA, State Department and White House declined requests for formal
comment.
(c) Copyright 1999 The
Associated Press
