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CNN Live Today
Weapons Inspectors Fan Out for Second Day of Searches
Aired November 28, 2002 - 11:10 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: Weapons inspectors once again fanned out for a second day of searches. One stop, an old animal vaccine factory that was once shut down for churning out biological weapons.
CNN's Nic Robertson is in Baghdad. He has the latest on today's search -- Nic.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Marty, some interesting details from the inspectors who went to that animal vaccine facility. Now, they say in 1996, some of the equipment there was destroyed. This was equipment that the Iraqis declared to be part of their biological weapons, botulium (ph) toxin production fermenters were destroyed.
Now the inspectors said that what had happened then in '96, everything that the Iraqis declared at that site to be part of their program were destroyed. However, there were other fermenters, other pieces of equipment that they said could be dual-use equipment, that, Iraqi authorities didn't declare, the U.N. didn't destroy them, but they put tags on them.
When this team went back today, they found that some of that equipment was missing. Now, this is what they say has been important about this mission of going back to previously visited sites to see what has been happening there.
They demanded the director of the site, what has happened to this equipment, it was on our infantry, where is it? The director told them on the facility on the north side of Baghdad, and the inspectors say they were immediately allowed to go to that other facility. At that facility, they found the equipment they were looking for.
So this is cooperation the inspectors have been looking for, but this is exactly, they say, the type of job that they're involved in right now, is tracking down all those pieces of inventory, all of those things that the U.N. weapons inspections in the 1990s have been observing, finding out where they are, and what they're being used for -- Marty.
SAVIDGE: Nic, as I watched your reports from yesterday and that initial inspection, talking about the weapons inspectors getting lost, and I am worried about the awkwardness for them in asking for directions because they don't want to give away where they are going.
ROBERTSON: That is a problem. Now, one would expect, as any stranger to run into problems in the first day or so getting out and about. But unlike you and I, when we are lost to a city, we can stop and ask for directions, they can't. They are making surprised, unannounced visits, and if they stop and say "Hey, where is so and so?" pretty quickly, everyone will know where they are headed. That was one of the problems they faced yesterday. Today, they didn't seem to have that same type of problem, but potentially could happen again.
SAVIDGE: Well, not to make light of it, but it is a wonderful sort of human insight into the very serious job they haven't had.
Nic Robertson, live in Baghdad, we thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired November 28, 2002 - 11:10 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: Weapons inspectors once again fanned out for a second day of searches. One stop, an old animal vaccine factory that was once shut down for churning out biological weapons.
CNN's Nic Robertson is in Baghdad. He has the latest on today's search -- Nic.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Marty, some interesting details from the inspectors who went to that animal vaccine facility. Now, they say in 1996, some of the equipment there was destroyed. This was equipment that the Iraqis declared to be part of their biological weapons, botulium (ph) toxin production fermenters were destroyed.
Now the inspectors said that what had happened then in '96, everything that the Iraqis declared at that site to be part of their program were destroyed. However, there were other fermenters, other pieces of equipment that they said could be dual-use equipment, that, Iraqi authorities didn't declare, the U.N. didn't destroy them, but they put tags on them.
When this team went back today, they found that some of that equipment was missing. Now, this is what they say has been important about this mission of going back to previously visited sites to see what has been happening there.
They demanded the director of the site, what has happened to this equipment, it was on our infantry, where is it? The director told them on the facility on the north side of Baghdad, and the inspectors say they were immediately allowed to go to that other facility. At that facility, they found the equipment they were looking for.
So this is cooperation the inspectors have been looking for, but this is exactly, they say, the type of job that they're involved in right now, is tracking down all those pieces of inventory, all of those things that the U.N. weapons inspections in the 1990s have been observing, finding out where they are, and what they're being used for -- Marty.
SAVIDGE: Nic, as I watched your reports from yesterday and that initial inspection, talking about the weapons inspectors getting lost, and I am worried about the awkwardness for them in asking for directions because they don't want to give away where they are going.
ROBERTSON: That is a problem. Now, one would expect, as any stranger to run into problems in the first day or so getting out and about. But unlike you and I, when we are lost to a city, we can stop and ask for directions, they can't. They are making surprised, unannounced visits, and if they stop and say "Hey, where is so and so?" pretty quickly, everyone will know where they are headed. That was one of the problems they faced yesterday. Today, they didn't seem to have that same type of problem, but potentially could happen again.
SAVIDGE: Well, not to make light of it, but it is a wonderful sort of human insight into the very serious job they haven't had.
Nic Robertson, live in Baghdad, we thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
