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What was the relationship between Saddam Hussein's inner circle and Islamic terrorists? A newly released document captured in Iraq, but never before seen by the public, offers glimmers of new insight at the Pentagon's Foreign Military Studies Office Web site. The FMSO is a research and analysis center under the U.S. Army's Training and Doctrine Command. This particular document mentions two men with similar names, each with ties to Pakistani religious schools known as madrassas, Jihad training camps, the Taliban and Al Qaeda. This original translation by my translator-colleague, who goes by the nom de guerre of "Sammi," comes from...

The US must abandon its "war on terror" to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, according to the former United Nations' chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix. The US foreign policy of pre-emptive strikes against any perceived weapons of mass destruction (WMD) threat, its development of new types of nuclear weapons and the "Star Wars" missile defence shield risked fuelling a new global arms race, said Dr Blix. Dr Blix's warning came in a report, released yesterday, proposing ways to bring about global nuclear, biological and chemical disarmament. The report by the independent international Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission...

A former UN weapons inspector has urged Iran and Israel to end their nuclear activities and criticised the US for seeking militaristic remedies to disagreements. The recommendation was one of 60 put forward in a report prepared by the 14-member Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, an initiative of the Swedish government set up in 2003. Hans Blix, who led the UN search for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons in Iraq before the US-led invasion, presented the report to Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general. Blix said that the US had "looked more to its own military power for remedies" instead of...

Former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix believed the Government’s controversial Iraq weapons dossier actually understated the case against Saddam Hussein, according to documents released today by the Foreign Office. The papers released by the FO show that British officials at the United Nations in New York showed a draft of the dossier to Dr Blix in September 2002, two weeks before the final version was published. A note from one official, Adam Bye, said that Dr Blix had liked the section on chemical, biological and nuclear weapons as he believed that it did not exaggerate the facts. According to...

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - Former chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix said Thursday it would take many years for Iran to achieve the capability to produce highly enriched uranium needed for an atomic bomb. Blix also dismissed worries about a new nuclear reactor being built in Iran, saying it was not suitable to produce weapons-grade material. "They have many years to go before they will be able to produce highly enriched uranium for a bomb and I believe there is plenty of room for negotiations," Blix said in an interview with Swedish Radio. The U.S. has accused Iran of trying...

LONDON (IRNA) -- Former International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director general Hans Blix has expressed doubt if anything would be achieved by referring Iran to the UN if it restarted its nuclear fuel cycle program, suggesting it could prove to be counterproductive. "I am not sure much will be gained from taking to the Security Council, except more escalation and getting into more dangerous situation," Blix said. "I hope there will be a continuation of negotiations" between the EU and Iran in trying to reach long-term arrangements on its nuclear program, he said, believing that it was not too late...

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Former U.N. chief arms inspector Hans Blix urged Iran and Israel on Monday to support a ban on nuclear enrichment across the Middle East as a possible compromise on curbing Tehran's nuclear ambitions. Making the Middle East an enrichment-free zone would be in the interests of both Iran and Israel, Blix told a news conference on the sidelines of a month-long meeting of the 188 signatories of the 1970 nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. "I think Israel is extremely interested in having Iran refrain from moving on" to resuming enrichment activities, Blix said. "I'm surprised the idea has...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Washington isn't taking "the common bargain" of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as seriously as it once did, and that's dimming global support for the U.S. campaign to shut down the North Korean and Iranian nuclear programs, the former chief U.N. weapons inspector said. Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton, by questioning the value of treaties and international law, has also damaged the U.S. position, Hans Blix said. "There is a feeling the common edifice of the international community is being dismantled," the Swedish arms expert said. Blix, now chairman of the Swedish government-sponsored Weapons of Mass...

ASSOCIATED PRESS An Iraqi scientist has told U.S. interrogators that her team destroyed Iraq's stock of anthrax in 1991 by dumping it practically at the gates of one of Saddam's main palaces, but never told U.N. inspectors for fear of angering the dictator. Rihab Rashid Taha's decision in 2003 to remain silent stoked suspicions of those who contended Iraq still harbored biological weapons, contributing to the U.S. decision to invade Iraq two years ago this month. "Whether those involved understood the significance and disastrous consequences of their actions is unclear," the CIA-led Iraq Survey Group says of Mrs. Taha and...

GREAT BARRINGTON -- Former U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix said last night that the world may see peace before it sees a warming in the relationship between the United Nations and the United States. "I'm optimistic for peace in the long run," he said. "There has been tremendous change in the world." But as for the relationship between his organization and the country in which it is located, "well, it couldn't get any worse," Blix said. "There are some people in the United States who would like to see [the United Nations] slide down into the East River." Blix was...

Move over Teresa Heinz-Kerry, here comes Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin. Lansdowne Technologies Inc. (LTI), the Paul Martin corporation that somehow disappeared from Martin's public disclosure statements circa 1995, is in a business similar to the Heinz-Kerry charitable organization that links leftwing activists and UN radicals to specially designed Internet communications and virtual private networks. Between the woman who coveted being America's First Lady and the Prime Minister of the country next door, top advocates of One World Government are being expedited in droves onto the Information Highway. Through the Tides Foundation, back in the early 1990s Heinz-Kerry (Mrs. John...

“Saddam Hussein has killed more Muslims than anybody, and Muslims kill each other faster than anybody else kills them. We try to save them and get preached to and blamed by these holier-than-thou gurus. I'm fed up with it.” AND OTHER GREAT RUSH QUOTES:THIS WEEK “We are in the midst of Marta birthweek, but Tuesday is her actual birthday.” “The oil-for-food program is designed to aid the starving, suffering Iraqis. Instead, what we have is a cash cow administered solely by Kofi Annan and the UN.” “The left is built around people who do not want solutions to the problems...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The United Nations Correspondents Association gave its second annual "Citizen of the World" awards to former U.N. weapons chief Hans Blix, top U.N. troubleshooter Lakhdar Brahimi and actress Nicole Kidman, who is a goodwill ambassador for the U.N. Children's Fund in Australia. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who presented the awards at a black-tie dinner at U.N. headquarters Friday night, joked about calls for his resignation over allegations of corruption in the U.N. oil-for-food program in Iraq. "Tonight, I have resigned myself," he said, pausing for several moments before adding, "to having a good time." Annan made...

Liberals on Capitol Hill and in the media are screaming, "Where are the weapons?" Since the White House had argued that disarming Saddam was the main reason for going to war, not finding his forbidden weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) all lined up like prizes at a seaside shooting gallery has excited the president's political enemies to cry foul. Ewan Buchanan, spokesman for chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix, assures Insight that "it's far too early to tell" whether forbidden weapons remain in Iraq or where they might be. "It doesn't surprise me that U.S. forces haven't found anything yet....

Copyright 2003 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest Global Communications Corp. All Rights Reserved The Gazette (Montreal, Quebec) January 10, 2003 Friday Final Edition SECTION: News; Pg. A4 LENGTH: 794 words HEADLINE: UN inspectors find no 'smoking gun': Diplomats back off on war deadline. Blix charges Iraq with violating sanctions against importation of missile engines SOURCE: Southam News; The Gazette contributed to this report BYLINE: JOE LAURIA, SEAN GORDON of The Gazette contributed to this report DATELINE: UNITED NATIONS [SNIP] Also, Mohammed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said Iraq had not accounted for a quantity of HMX...

Former United Nations weapons inspector Hans Bliz yesterday urged Western nations to offer conscessions to Iran if they want the government there to scrap uranium enrichment, Blix said.Iran has every right to conduct and enrichment programme, Blix said. Blix said concessions to persuade Tehran might also include improved trade relations or a non-agression pact, he added.If Western nations asked Iran to abandon enrichment, Blix said, 'Then you are asking them to give up something they have a right to be doing. Then you have to accept that they will make demands.'Blix warned against air attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities and...

A mass grave being excavated in a north Iraqi village has yielded evidence that Iraqi forces executed women and children under Saddam Hussein. US-led investigators have located nine trenches in Hatra containing hundreds of bodies believed to be Kurds killed during the repression of the 1980s. The skeletons of unborn babies and toddlers clutching toys are being unearthed, the investigators said. They are seeking evidence to try Saddam Hussein for crimes against humanity. It is believed to be the first time investigators working for the Iraqi Special Tribunal (IST) have conducted a full scientific exhumation of a mass grave. "It...

...The pro-Saddam lobby claims that the policy of containment had worked, and should have been continued ad infinitum. But the truth is that, as far as Iraq's various obligations under Security Council resolutions were concerned, containment had failed, and the sanctions had begun to crumble. Even on WMDs it had not worked because Saddam had kicked U.N. inspectors out four years earlier. ...America and its allies could have kept 200,000 soldiers in the Arabian desert for an indefinite number of years as a stick with which to persuade Saddam not to restart WMD programs. Yet then Saddam, assured of survival,...

Former Iraqi Oil Minister Surrenders 16 minutes ago By NIKO PRICE, Associated Press Writer BAGHDAD, Iraq - Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s former oil minister, a trusted adviser who earlier oversaw Iraq (news - web sites)'s top-secret missile programs, has surrendered to U.S.-led forces, the U.S. Central Command said Tuesday. AP Photo (AP Video) Latest news: · U.S. Soldiers Fire at Iraqi Protesters AP - 6 minutes ago · Former Iraqi Oil Minister Surrenders AP - 16 minutes ago · Last Soldier Missing in Iraq Found Dead AP - 27 minutes ago Special Coverage   Amer Mohammed Rashid, known...