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STATEMENT BY THE SPOKESPERSON
FRENCH MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS
16 January 2003
Mr. Blix, Executive Chairman of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, (UNMOVIC) and Mr. ElBaradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, will be received by the president at 9:00 a.m. and then by Mr. de Villepin at 10:00 a.m. on Friday, January17, 2003.
The meeting will be used to review the situation before the two heads ofthe UN inspection team for Iraq leave for Baghdad in the perspective of their report due January 27 under resolution 1441. We hope that everything is done so that the process of peacefully disarming Iraq continues. This implies of course active cooperation on the part of the authorities in Baghdad.
Mr. ElBaradei announced in Moscow this morning that the IAEA was going to ask the Security Council to extend the mandate of the UN inspectors in Iraq for several months. Do you have any comment?
From the outset Mr. Blix and Mr. ElBaradei explained to the Council that the past two months would be devoted to strengthening their team after four years of interruption. So the statement seem logical, especially as resolution 1441 stipulates the conditions in which the inspections are to take place, spelling out among other things the inspectors' rights, but it obviously does not abrogate resolution 1284 which details the timetable of operations.
What's the next stage in the Security Council on this?
The next stage is January 27 when there will be a new report. Mr. Blix and Mr. ElBaradei will be reporting on the conditions in which they've been able to strengthen their teams.