ARABS-UN RELATIONS - March 1 - Unmovic Report.

A classified report by UN's Iraq arms inspection group (Unmovic) says Iraq's missiles, biological weapons and chemical weapons form the three main areas of concern. (Unmovic is a group of weapons experts and inspectors set up in late 1999 by the UN Security Council to succeed Unscom, the controversial former inspection body for Iraq which was disbanded after it withdrew from the country in December 1998. The new group's report is a preliminary document presented last month to a meeting in Vienna of the "College of Commissioners for Unmovic", a group of 16 international advisers appointed by the Security Council to guide Unmovic's work. No official from Unmovic has visited Iraq since Unscom was disbanded and the document is mainly based on analysis of information inherited from Unscom).

On the missile file, Unmovic believes Iraq could still harbour two imported long-range Scud B missiles as well as possibly indigenous Scud B type missiles. The document states Iraq could have launchers as well as fuel for the missiles. Baghdad may have reassembled Scud launchers by stripping hydraulic, electric and electronic components from mobile Scud launchers it was forced to destroy. On chemical weapons, Iraq could still have mustard gas, as well as the shells capable of delivering it. As many as 500-700 155mm shells remain unaccounted for, the report states, citing Unscom documentation.

(Iraq says it melted 15,000 special 122mm rocket warheads, which are also used in chemical warfare. But Unmovic believes remaining ingots do not verify that fact). Iraq researched other means of delivering chemical weapons, such as using aerial spray/drop tanks. Unscom had found documents that verified that "spray/drop tanks for the dissemination of CW agents had been successfully tested with mustard agent and that the necessary stocks of bulk CW agents had been reserved for their filling", leading Unmovic to list the programme as an "unresolved disarmament issue". Remaining volumes of imported phosphorus trichloride (PCI3), a precursor of chemical warfare agents such as mustard gas, are also unresolved.

Whether Iraq has or had weaponised VX nerve agent - remains unclear. Regarding the biological file, Unmovic found "the production of Agent B (anthrax spores) could be much greater than stated and, had such production taken place, the remaining quantities would still retain significant activity given the stability of this agent". Unscom believed Iraq produced tens of thousands of litres of Agent B and that more than the 50 R400 aerial bombs and five Al-Hussein warheads Iraq admitted to could have been made into usable weapons. Iraq's research into viruses - including polio, influenza, foot and mouth disease, the camelpox virus, infectious haemorrhagic conjunctivitis virus and rotavirus - was also worrying. "In the absence of further documentary evidence and explanation, the rationale and the scope of the virus research undertaken remains unclear, in particular the basis for selection of the viruses", Unmovic states.