WASHINGTON – In his first comments on the weapons inspections in Iraq, President Bush said yesterday that Saddam Hussein’s approach is “not encouraging.”
“So far, the signs are not encouraging,” Bush said of the ongoing U.N. weapons-inspection process.
Inspectors reported yesterday that equipment at the Waziriyah missile-development plant near Baghdad had vanished from the site, where it was last seen in 1998, and that the Iraqis claimed it had been bombed or moved.
“The inspectors are not in Iraq to play hide-and-seek with Mr. Saddam Hussein,” Bush said at the Pentagon, where he signed a $355 billion defense bill.
Early this morning, the inspectors made their first unannounced visit to one of Saddam Hussein’s presidential palaces, going into one in central Baghdad.
Disputes over the palaces contributed to the expulsion of weapons inspectors in 1998, but U.N. vehicles were allowed to enter after seven minutes of discussion.
Saddam has until Sunday to list his chemical, biological and nuclear weapons – and then get rid of them – if he wants to avert war.
United Nations inspectors have been in Iraq for a week, looking for signs of those weapons, which Iraq claimed didn’t exist in a letter three weeks ago.
There was tough talk from others in the Bush administration, suggesting the administration may be prepping Americans for conflict.
“We have now called an end to Saddam’s game,” Vice President Dick Cheney said at a National Guard conference in Colorado.
“Delay and defiance will invite the severest consequences. The demands of the world will be met, or action will be unavoidable.”
Cheney repeated the administration’s claim that “Saddam Hussein is harboring terrorists and the instruments of terror.”
Bush said he’s watching the weapons-inspections process with one overall question in mind: “Has Saddam Hussein changed his behavior of the last 11 years?”