NYPost

U.S.: IRAQ LIST THICK WITH LIES By NILES LATHEM and DEBORAH ORIN and ALY SUJO

December 8, 2002 -- Saddam Hussein's technocrats yesterday handed over a mountain of documents that they said was clear proof that Iraq had no nuclear, biological or chemical weapons - but U.S. officials said was just a stack of lies.

The paper arsenal was a stack of "half-truths, fictions and incomplete facts," a high-ranking Bush administration official said.

Iraq's long-awaited truckload of data - written in Arabic and tortured English - was delivered to U.N. officials in Baghdad as Saddam took to the airwaves to apologize to the people of Kuwait for his bloody 1990 invasion of his neighbors.

Kuwait immediately rejected his apology. [Nice to see SOMEbody has some balls in that region.]

The weekend events were clearly designed to help Saddam clear his international reputation after a decade of war and sanctions - and to garner sympathy from the Arab world.

The massive list - longer than the Baghdad telephone directory - was laid out for reporters' cameras in a downtown government office.

The dossier, a total of 11,807 pages bound in blue and red covers, included 1,334 pages on biological programs, 1,823 on chemical programs, 6,887 on missiles, and 12 CD-ROMs stuffed with data and other material related to nuclear weapons.

Iraqi Lt. Gen. Hossam Mohammed Amin said the document would "answer all the questions which have been addressed during the last months and years."

"I reiterate here Iraq has no weapons of mass destruction," he told reporters. "I think if the United States has the minimum level of fairness and braveness, it should accept the report and say this is the truth."

But a high-ranking Bush administration official told The Post that Baghdad's arms accountants had probably cooked the books.

"The general consensus here is that it will contain lots of half-truths, fictions and incomplete facts," said the official, adding that Iraq's convoluted paper trail was intended to dampen U.S. efforts to unseat Saddam - and would likely prolong the inspection process.

"A big volume of documents doesn't mean [it's] a clear or complete report," said another senior U.S. official, adding that the United States had evidence that the Iraqis "not only continued but have accelerated" their weapons programs.

-- Anonymous, December 08, 2002

Answers

Kuwait rejects Iraq's apology

The Kuwaiti government has rejected an apology from Iraq, over its occupation of the Gulf Arab state in 1990 and 1991.

Iraq's information minister delivered a televised message to the Kuwaiti people appealing to them to rise up against foreigners, who he said were inflicting evil on Arab peoples.

Kuwait's government says the apology is unworthy of a response and accused the Iraqi president Saddam Hussein of inciting terror attacks.

The apology was delivered as Iraq was handing over to the UN a dossier on its military programmes, ahead of a deadline set by the Security Council.

The government again denied that the country had any weapons of mass destruction.

The US President George Bush said earlier that his administration will take some time to judge the declaration, but repeated that it will disarm Iraq by force if necessary.

-- Anonymous, December 08, 2002

The dossier, a total of 11,807 pages bound in blue and red covers,... and I assume white pages.

Red, white and blue? Message here?

-- Anonymous, December 09, 2002