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CNN Live Saturday

Iraqi Report Expected to Arrive at U.N. Headquarters Tomorrow

Aired December 07, 2002 - 15:06   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.


KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: The massive report is expected to arrive at U.N. headquarters in New York tomorrow. There, a painstaking phase will begin as detailed technical information is translated from Arabic. Some of the data may be a repeat of information supplied to the Security Council before, and some of it may be so sensitive, the U.N. won't make it public. CNN's Michael Okwu is at the U.N. Now, Michael, once the documents get there, what's the next step?
MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Basically, the documents get here to the United Nations, Kyra, and they are handed over to the chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix. He will then start painstakingly, along with his associates, start basically siphoning through all of this, sifting through the 11,000-page-plus document.

Now, why is he doing this? Well, in his role as the chief weapons inspector, he has basically been called on by the Security Council to edit out what they consider to be very sensitive pieces of information in there. What they don't want, in the words of some Security Council members is, a manual for weapons of mass destruction to be conveyed to the public.

They are also very concerned about the fact that if they make this information public, they could very well violate international treaties and conventions that govern these sort of things. So he will be taking a look at the document. And then at some point in the future, he will be getting back in touch with the council and letting them know, giving them a better sense about when they can expect to see the document, but everyone says this is a process that could take weeks rather than days -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, what are the larger implications of editing out parts of that document?

OKWU: Well, that's an interesting question. Hans Blix, as you know, is basically a soldier, he says, of the Security Council. And, of course, the Security Council members take their orders from their capitals. All along, the feeling has been that intelligence agencies in these capitals, most notably around the Washington, D.C. area, will be squaring up this information, comparing the information in the document with their own independent sources.

The U.N. has had declarations from Iraq in the past. In fact, there's a database of some one million pages in the files of the United Nations. And they, too, U.N. officials, would be squaring up their information in this database with the information in the document. Now if they don't, if they can't be in a position of seeing this document in its entirety, then it makes it very difficult for them to actually assess whether the Iraqi government is being completely complicit in all of this. It really slows down the process, so you can imagine in the coming days, this is an issue they're going to want to resolve very quickly -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right, so what's the next step now?

OKWU: The next step is Blix gets this document. He apparently is meeting with the Security Council on Tuesday. This is not a formal meeting. It's a regularly scheduled luncheon along with the secretary-general. They do this every month or so. The Security Council members are hoping that they will get a better sense from Blix as to when they will actually see the documents.

So we can't actually answer that question, although a Western diplomatic source is telling CNN that it is unlikely that Blix will have anything of great substance to say until the week of the 16th. And even when we do get to the week of the 16th, we are told that this is really going to be an initial assessment. Some of that sort of dubious phraseology that you sometimes hear at the United Nations, which basically means, look, we're going to get back in touch with each other, we are going to sit down and we are going to figure out where to go from next. Because you can bet that key member states of the council, most notably the United States, do not want to see -- do not want to see that this document is not given to them in full. That's something they certainly will work out -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Live from the U.N., Michael Okwu, thanks so much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




Tomorrow>


Aired December 7, 2002 - 15:06   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: The massive report is expected to arrive at U.N. headquarters in New York tomorrow. There, a painstaking phase will begin as detailed technical information is translated from Arabic. Some of the data may be a repeat of information supplied to the Security Council before, and some of it may be so sensitive, the U.N. won't make it public. CNN's Michael Okwu is at the U.N. Now, Michael, once the documents get there, what's the next step?
MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Basically, the documents get here to the United Nations, Kyra, and they are handed over to the chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix. He will then start painstakingly, along with his associates, start basically siphoning through all of this, sifting through the 11,000-page-plus document.

Now, why is he doing this? Well, in his role as the chief weapons inspector, he has basically been called on by the Security Council to edit out what they consider to be very sensitive pieces of information in there. What they don't want, in the words of some Security Council members is, a manual for weapons of mass destruction to be conveyed to the public.

They are also very concerned about the fact that if they make this information public, they could very well violate international treaties and conventions that govern these sort of things. So he will be taking a look at the document. And then at some point in the future, he will be getting back in touch with the council and letting them know, giving them a better sense about when they can expect to see the document, but everyone says this is a process that could take weeks rather than days -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, what are the larger implications of editing out parts of that document?

OKWU: Well, that's an interesting question. Hans Blix, as you know, is basically a soldier, he says, of the Security Council. And, of course, the Security Council members take their orders from their capitals. All along, the feeling has been that intelligence agencies in these capitals, most notably around the Washington, D.C. area, will be squaring up this information, comparing the information in the document with their own independent sources.

The U.N. has had declarations from Iraq in the past. In fact, there's a database of some one million pages in the files of the United Nations. And they, too, U.N. officials, would be squaring up their information in this database with the information in the document. Now if they don't, if they can't be in a position of seeing this document in its entirety, then it makes it very difficult for them to actually assess whether the Iraqi government is being completely complicit in all of this. It really slows down the process, so you can imagine in the coming days, this is an issue they're going to want to resolve very quickly -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right, so what's the next step now?

OKWU: The next step is Blix gets this document. He apparently is meeting with the Security Council on Tuesday. This is not a formal meeting. It's a regularly scheduled luncheon along with the secretary-general. They do this every month or so. The Security Council members are hoping that they will get a better sense from Blix as to when they will actually see the documents.

So we can't actually answer that question, although a Western diplomatic source is telling CNN that it is unlikely that Blix will have anything of great substance to say until the week of the 16th. And even when we do get to the week of the 16th, we are told that this is really going to be an initial assessment. Some of that sort of dubious phraseology that you sometimes hear at the United Nations, which basically means, look, we're going to get back in touch with each other, we are going to sit down and we are going to figure out where to go from next. Because you can bet that key member states of the council, most notably the United States, do not want to see -- do not want to see that this document is not given to them in full. That's something they certainly will work out -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Live from the U.N., Michael Okwu, thanks so much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




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