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Talk with Iraqi Ambassador to U.N.

Aired January 27, 2003 - 13:20   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: Inspectors want more time. To Baghdad now, CNN's Nic Robertson live from the Iraqi capital -- Nic.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, well, Iraqi officials said from the outset they expected this report on them to be gray. Perhaps we're beginning to get the first indications of what shade of gray it has turned out for them, and that appears to be a darker shade of gray.

On a television station here run by Saddam Hussein's son, Uday Saddam Hussein, on a chat show, an academic saying that Hans Blix focused on more of the negative, rather than the positive. So perhaps some early hints here that this is not been received as well as Iraqis might have expected it would have gone for them. Certainly speaking before Hans Blix made his address, the U.N. Security Council Iraq's Foreign Minister Naji Sabri was thinking very much about the issues of potential war, saying that there was still time for diplomacy. But for many Iraqis here, there are plenty of signs around them that the potential for war is there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (voice-over): As Iraqi TV broadcast video of troops and tanks preparing for war, and soldiers vowing to fight to the death, Iraq's foreign minister suggested war with the United States may not be inevitable.

NAJI SABRI, IRAQI FOREIGN MINISTER: All times are for diplomacy. It is the ones who say there are no time for diplomacy are war mongers.

ROBERTSON: During a lengthy 45-minute news conference, however, he said it was the United States and Britain that needed to be reigned in, from what he called their evil desire to dominate the region and the world.

SABRI: There are no weapons of mass destruction or related activities in Iraq, but the aim is their desire to control.

ROBERTSON: Characterizing Iraq's relationship with weapons inspectors as "super cooperation," Sabri said on the contention issue of private interviews with Iraqi scientists, Iraq was abiding by U.N. resolution 1441.

SABRI: Our cooperation is in providing access to all these people. And we are doing this. ROBERTSON: Accusations over the weekend by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell that Iraq has ties to Al Qaeda have also drawn quick condemnation.

TARIQ AZIZ, IRAQI DEP. PRIME MINISTER: We don have any relationship with terroristic groups.

QUESTION: Nothing with Al Qaeda?

AZIZ: Nothing with Al Qaeda.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON: So despite the strong tones coming from Iraqi officials here, they do say they're willing to let the weapons inspectors continue with their work, and they say that is because they want to prove to the United States that they have no weapons of mass destruction -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Nic Robertson, live from Baghdad, thank you.

Well, the important thing is the reason for an invasion, not the date. That's the view of Joseph Wilson, who was acting U.S. ambassador to Iraq in 1991 when the embassy was evacuated during Operation Desert Shield. Ambassador Wilson joins us live from Washington.

Thank you for being with us.

AMB. JOSEPH WILSON, FMR. ACTING U.S. AMB. TO IRAQ: Hi, Kyra, how are you today?

PHILLIPS: Very good, actually. Tell me your first reaction to what we heard today from Hans Blix.

WILSON: Well, I think that it was, as Nic said, darker gray than lighter gray. I think it should give the administration at least some ammunition in a future debate with the U.N. Security Council that Iraq, if it has been complying, or if it has been cooperating, has not been complying, and even that cooperation, according to Blix, is somewhat suspect on a number of grounds.

PHILLIPS: Do you think that inspectors need more time?

WILSON: I think it's fair to give the inspectors more time. Certainly they've asked for it. Certainly there's a sense in the international community they should get it. That said, I don't think this is going to be an open-ended exercise. The credible -- the credibility of the threat of force diminishes the longer that you allow the inspectors to inspect and become victims of Saddam's rope a dope strategy.

PHILLIPS: "The New York Times," the op-ed piece today, talking about Bush avoiding the inspections trap. Do you believe that the president is in an inspections trap? WILSON: Well, I don't think he's in an inspections trap. He can avoid it any time he wants. I read the article with great interest. Ken Pollack's book, "The Threatening Storm," is probably the best political book that's been done on this subject, and even he argues that we should engage in a regime-change operation, but only because coercive containment hasn't worked. In fact, while that book was being published, the president adroitly went up to the United Nations and put back into place coercive containment. So I don't think we're in that inspections trap just yet.

PHILLIPS: You have dealt with Saddam Hussein. You did deal with Saddam Hussein quite a bit. Is the only way to quell this threat through war?

WILSON: Well, in order to get Saddam to yield on anything, you have to have the credible threat of force. You basically have to stare him down. And even then, he has a penchant for miscalculation. But I think it's important to engage in that staredown process. It's important that that credible threat of force be out there, and that he not misunderstand what his options are.

I fear right now that he may not see that he has many options, that essentially he's been told, we're going to kill you and take away your weapons of mass destruction. He's not hearing the president say forcible disarmament or the international community saying disarmament. He's just hearing, you're going to kill me.

PHILLIPS: When you were ambassador to Iraq, did you trust Saddam Hussein?

WILSON: First, I was acting ambassador. I was under the foreign deputy. But I was charged of agency under Desert Shield. And of course not, I did not trust Saddam Hussein as far as I could throw this television studio, nor did I trust Tariq Aziz, who was just, of course, quoted on your program.

PHILLIPS: What do you think is going to happen next?

WILSON: Well, it's hard to say. I think that we will probably engage in additional debate up at the U.N. Security Council. It may be a resolution. It may be just the informing of the U.N. Security Council. If it is a resolution, it will probably call for use of all necessary means, i.e. force, in order to disarm Saddam.

Hopefully, we'll have our allies on board, so whatever we do is not perceived as an act of American aggression or imperialism. Alternative, that assumes the weapons of mass destruction line is one we're going down. The administration has raised the possibility of ties with Al Qaeda, and that's a totally different proposition. That would justify, it seems to me, an action in the context of the attack on the World Trade Center, if we could demonstrate that they were tied to the World Trade Center.

PHILLIPS: When you were acting U.S. ambassador to Iraq, do you remember evidence of any type of tie Iraq connected to any type of terrorist group like Al Qaeda? WILSON: Well, Al Qaeda was certainly not a force then. But in Baghdad while I was there, Carlos was reportedly to be there, as well as Abu Abas, the architect of the Killy Loror (ph) attack, and Abu Ibrahim, know as the bomb maker, the suitcase bomb maker. Carlos was reported to be drinking Chivas Regal (ph), and you could tell when he was in town, because there were empty bottles in the garbage can of the hotel he was staying at, and that was in a CNN report, by the way.

PHILLIPS: Thank you for quoting us.

My final question to you. I think many Americans were looking to today's report, to the live coverage here on CNN to see if there were any major indictments made. Do you believe there were any major indictments made against Iraq?

WILSON: Well, I think the lack of compliance in and of itself is a major indictment. Material breach is a term that everybody has used, and I think from the time that Saddam first submitted the declaration in December, he's been in material breach. The question is not whether Saddam is in material breach or not; the question is how best to disarm him and what we, the international community, and the United States, ought to do to disarm him. I think that's where we're going down, and that's where Mr. Elbaradei and Mr. Blix have made the point they need more time.

Mr. Elbaradei, in fact, has said that just having inspectors in there serves as a deterrent. So we need to take all of that into consideration before we launch an invasion, which no doubt we would succeed in overthrowing the regime, despite whatever obstacles Saddam might put in place, but then would leave us and occupying this country for the foreseeable future, and all that that entails, including the very real possibility it would encourage a whole new generation of terrorists.

PHILLIPS: Ambassador Joseph Wilson, thank you for your time.

WILSON: Pleasure.

PHILLIPS: Now we're going to go to the U.N. for the other side to this debate, of course, Mohammed Al Douri, Iraqi ambassador to the U.N.

Sir, thanks for being us.

MOHAMMED AL DOURI, IRAQI AMB. TO U.N.: Well, you know, he tried to describe what has been done by inspectors on the ground there, and also he talked indirectly about his meeting with authorities concerned in Baghdad last time. He raised several questions, and several issues. These issues have been raised, although we did ask him several times that we want to discuss this issue and details with him, but he want to discuss thoroughly these questions just mentioned them in the meetings.

So I have been surprised, too, that Mr. Blix mentioned all these questions because we asked him to discuss with him what the so-called the remaining issues in the interim (ph) report. PHILLIPS: Let's talk about some of those remaining issues, sir, specifically the large quantities of VX poison gas and anthrax. Has all of this been destroyed?

AL DOURI: Well, you know, these stories are all -- these are not new, new ones. These stories has been discussed with already Mr. Icarus (ph), and after that, it's Mr. Butler. So these questions are not new issues. So we have the possibility to discuss with Mr. Blix all these issues, which are very ancient and mentioned in the U.N. report. That means he have nothing new to say to the Security Council about really the period between '98 and right now.

PHILLIPS: Well, inspectors continue to say that Iraqi officials have failed to account for chemical and biological weapons. Is that true?

AL DOURI: Well, I think they are there. They have the whole cooperation from the Iraqi side. We have decided to cooperate fully with them and we will continue with that. Right now, they find nothing, and we are confident that they will find nothing in the future. For this reason, there have been allowed to go wherever they want to go without any obstruction from anybody there.

PHILLIPS: Ambassador, is Saddam Hussein an innocent man? Is he just sorely misunderstood here?

AL DOURI: Sorry.

PHILLIPS: I'm asking you if your president, Saddam Hussein, if you feel that he is just misunderstood. Is he an innocent man?

AL DOURI: Misunderstood by whom?

PHILLIPS: Misunderstood by Americans, misunderstood by the president of the United States?

AL DOURI: Well, you know, I think there is no confidence between us and the United States, and we need to rebuild that confidence. We want that. We have nothing against that. And that would not be -- I mean, we cannot touch it without being together and discuss what are the questions to be discussed by both parties.

But just like that accusing the president or other people from your people, I think this is not the way to resolve peacefully the questions that are on table.

PHILLIPS: Mohammed Al Douri, Iraqi ambassador to the U.N., thank you for your time, sir.

AL DOURI: Thank you very 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







Aired January 27, 2003 - 13:20   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Inspectors want more time. To Baghdad now, CNN's Nic Robertson live from the Iraqi capital -- Nic.
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, well, Iraqi officials said from the outset they expected this report on them to be gray. Perhaps we're beginning to get the first indications of what shade of gray it has turned out for them, and that appears to be a darker shade of gray.

On a television station here run by Saddam Hussein's son, Uday Saddam Hussein, on a chat show, an academic saying that Hans Blix focused on more of the negative, rather than the positive. So perhaps some early hints here that this is not been received as well as Iraqis might have expected it would have gone for them. Certainly speaking before Hans Blix made his address, the U.N. Security Council Iraq's Foreign Minister Naji Sabri was thinking very much about the issues of potential war, saying that there was still time for diplomacy. But for many Iraqis here, there are plenty of signs around them that the potential for war is there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (voice-over): As Iraqi TV broadcast video of troops and tanks preparing for war, and soldiers vowing to fight to the death, Iraq's foreign minister suggested war with the United States may not be inevitable.

NAJI SABRI, IRAQI FOREIGN MINISTER: All times are for diplomacy. It is the ones who say there are no time for diplomacy are war mongers.

ROBERTSON: During a lengthy 45-minute news conference, however, he said it was the United States and Britain that needed to be reigned in, from what he called their evil desire to dominate the region and the world.

SABRI: There are no weapons of mass destruction or related activities in Iraq, but the aim is their desire to control.

ROBERTSON: Characterizing Iraq's relationship with weapons inspectors as "super cooperation," Sabri said on the contention issue of private interviews with Iraqi scientists, Iraq was abiding by U.N. resolution 1441.

SABRI: Our cooperation is in providing access to all these people. And we are doing this. ROBERTSON: Accusations over the weekend by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell that Iraq has ties to Al Qaeda have also drawn quick condemnation.

TARIQ AZIZ, IRAQI DEP. PRIME MINISTER: We don have any relationship with terroristic groups.

QUESTION: Nothing with Al Qaeda?

AZIZ: Nothing with Al Qaeda.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON: So despite the strong tones coming from Iraqi officials here, they do say they're willing to let the weapons inspectors continue with their work, and they say that is because they want to prove to the United States that they have no weapons of mass destruction -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Nic Robertson, live from Baghdad, thank you.

Well, the important thing is the reason for an invasion, not the date. That's the view of Joseph Wilson, who was acting U.S. ambassador to Iraq in 1991 when the embassy was evacuated during Operation Desert Shield. Ambassador Wilson joins us live from Washington.

Thank you for being with us.

AMB. JOSEPH WILSON, FMR. ACTING U.S. AMB. TO IRAQ: Hi, Kyra, how are you today?

PHILLIPS: Very good, actually. Tell me your first reaction to what we heard today from Hans Blix.

WILSON: Well, I think that it was, as Nic said, darker gray than lighter gray. I think it should give the administration at least some ammunition in a future debate with the U.N. Security Council that Iraq, if it has been complying, or if it has been cooperating, has not been complying, and even that cooperation, according to Blix, is somewhat suspect on a number of grounds.

PHILLIPS: Do you think that inspectors need more time?

WILSON: I think it's fair to give the inspectors more time. Certainly they've asked for it. Certainly there's a sense in the international community they should get it. That said, I don't think this is going to be an open-ended exercise. The credible -- the credibility of the threat of force diminishes the longer that you allow the inspectors to inspect and become victims of Saddam's rope a dope strategy.

PHILLIPS: "The New York Times," the op-ed piece today, talking about Bush avoiding the inspections trap. Do you believe that the president is in an inspections trap? WILSON: Well, I don't think he's in an inspections trap. He can avoid it any time he wants. I read the article with great interest. Ken Pollack's book, "The Threatening Storm," is probably the best political book that's been done on this subject, and even he argues that we should engage in a regime-change operation, but only because coercive containment hasn't worked. In fact, while that book was being published, the president adroitly went up to the United Nations and put back into place coercive containment. So I don't think we're in that inspections trap just yet.

PHILLIPS: You have dealt with Saddam Hussein. You did deal with Saddam Hussein quite a bit. Is the only way to quell this threat through war?

WILSON: Well, in order to get Saddam to yield on anything, you have to have the credible threat of force. You basically have to stare him down. And even then, he has a penchant for miscalculation. But I think it's important to engage in that staredown process. It's important that that credible threat of force be out there, and that he not misunderstand what his options are.

I fear right now that he may not see that he has many options, that essentially he's been told, we're going to kill you and take away your weapons of mass destruction. He's not hearing the president say forcible disarmament or the international community saying disarmament. He's just hearing, you're going to kill me.

PHILLIPS: When you were ambassador to Iraq, did you trust Saddam Hussein?

WILSON: First, I was acting ambassador. I was under the foreign deputy. But I was charged of agency under Desert Shield. And of course not, I did not trust Saddam Hussein as far as I could throw this television studio, nor did I trust Tariq Aziz, who was just, of course, quoted on your program.

PHILLIPS: What do you think is going to happen next?

WILSON: Well, it's hard to say. I think that we will probably engage in additional debate up at the U.N. Security Council. It may be a resolution. It may be just the informing of the U.N. Security Council. If it is a resolution, it will probably call for use of all necessary means, i.e. force, in order to disarm Saddam.

Hopefully, we'll have our allies on board, so whatever we do is not perceived as an act of American aggression or imperialism. Alternative, that assumes the weapons of mass destruction line is one we're going down. The administration has raised the possibility of ties with Al Qaeda, and that's a totally different proposition. That would justify, it seems to me, an action in the context of the attack on the World Trade Center, if we could demonstrate that they were tied to the World Trade Center.

PHILLIPS: When you were acting U.S. ambassador to Iraq, do you remember evidence of any type of tie Iraq connected to any type of terrorist group like Al Qaeda? WILSON: Well, Al Qaeda was certainly not a force then. But in Baghdad while I was there, Carlos was reportedly to be there, as well as Abu Abas, the architect of the Killy Loror (ph) attack, and Abu Ibrahim, know as the bomb maker, the suitcase bomb maker. Carlos was reported to be drinking Chivas Regal (ph), and you could tell when he was in town, because there were empty bottles in the garbage can of the hotel he was staying at, and that was in a CNN report, by the way.

PHILLIPS: Thank you for quoting us.

My final question to you. I think many Americans were looking to today's report, to the live coverage here on CNN to see if there were any major indictments made. Do you believe there were any major indictments made against Iraq?

WILSON: Well, I think the lack of compliance in and of itself is a major indictment. Material breach is a term that everybody has used, and I think from the time that Saddam first submitted the declaration in December, he's been in material breach. The question is not whether Saddam is in material breach or not; the question is how best to disarm him and what we, the international community, and the United States, ought to do to disarm him. I think that's where we're going down, and that's where Mr. Elbaradei and Mr. Blix have made the point they need more time.

Mr. Elbaradei, in fact, has said that just having inspectors in there serves as a deterrent. So we need to take all of that into consideration before we launch an invasion, which no doubt we would succeed in overthrowing the regime, despite whatever obstacles Saddam might put in place, but then would leave us and occupying this country for the foreseeable future, and all that that entails, including the very real possibility it would encourage a whole new generation of terrorists.

PHILLIPS: Ambassador Joseph Wilson, thank you for your time.

WILSON: Pleasure.

PHILLIPS: Now we're going to go to the U.N. for the other side to this debate, of course, Mohammed Al Douri, Iraqi ambassador to the U.N.

Sir, thanks for being us.

MOHAMMED AL DOURI, IRAQI AMB. TO U.N.: Well, you know, he tried to describe what has been done by inspectors on the ground there, and also he talked indirectly about his meeting with authorities concerned in Baghdad last time. He raised several questions, and several issues. These issues have been raised, although we did ask him several times that we want to discuss this issue and details with him, but he want to discuss thoroughly these questions just mentioned them in the meetings.

So I have been surprised, too, that Mr. Blix mentioned all these questions because we asked him to discuss with him what the so-called the remaining issues in the interim (ph) report. PHILLIPS: Let's talk about some of those remaining issues, sir, specifically the large quantities of VX poison gas and anthrax. Has all of this been destroyed?

AL DOURI: Well, you know, these stories are all -- these are not new, new ones. These stories has been discussed with already Mr. Icarus (ph), and after that, it's Mr. Butler. So these questions are not new issues. So we have the possibility to discuss with Mr. Blix all these issues, which are very ancient and mentioned in the U.N. report. That means he have nothing new to say to the Security Council about really the period between '98 and right now.

PHILLIPS: Well, inspectors continue to say that Iraqi officials have failed to account for chemical and biological weapons. Is that true?

AL DOURI: Well, I think they are there. They have the whole cooperation from the Iraqi side. We have decided to cooperate fully with them and we will continue with that. Right now, they find nothing, and we are confident that they will find nothing in the future. For this reason, there have been allowed to go wherever they want to go without any obstruction from anybody there.

PHILLIPS: Ambassador, is Saddam Hussein an innocent man? Is he just sorely misunderstood here?

AL DOURI: Sorry.

PHILLIPS: I'm asking you if your president, Saddam Hussein, if you feel that he is just misunderstood. Is he an innocent man?

AL DOURI: Misunderstood by whom?

PHILLIPS: Misunderstood by Americans, misunderstood by the president of the United States?

AL DOURI: Well, you know, I think there is no confidence between us and the United States, and we need to rebuild that confidence. We want that. We have nothing against that. And that would not be -- I mean, we cannot touch it without being together and discuss what are the questions to be discussed by both parties.

But just like that accusing the president or other people from your people, I think this is not the way to resolve peacefully the questions that are on table.

PHILLIPS: Mohammed Al Douri, Iraqi ambassador to the U.N., thank you for your time, sir.

AL DOURI: Thank you very 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