CIA agents as US inspectors in Iraq

Hello bonobos,

I heard this news last wednesday, I was to pass it to you before, but I took
a while to find a site where the same news appeared in english, so you're
not forced to trust me.

The following is my quick&dirty translation of the news as it appeared on
portuguese national television website, RTP Multimédia (www.rtp.pt):

"UN inspection missions where spying for the US

Former Executive Chairman of UNSCOM Rolf Ekéus who led one of the inspection
missions sent to Iraq revealed that those missions were used by the United
Stated to camouflage spying activity.

Rolf Ekéus, who spoke to the swedish diary "Svenska Dagbladet" of monday,
explained that among the delegation were two north-american spys who were
very busy placing electronic devices that would enable them to locate Saddam
Hussein. This activities, Ekéus added, were clearly out of the mandate of
the mission and for several times they were denounced by iraqi authorities.

The frequent denial of access by iraqi authorities to facilities that the
mission wanted to visit was at the time justified with those acusations of
spying. The UN mission had always, until now, vehemently rejected this
acusations, stating that this was a pretext to deny access to the very
facilities which was suspected to house the manufacturing of components for
chemical, biological or nuclear weapons.

The priority that the spies of the mission, according to Ekéus, gave to
locating the iraqi president seems confirmed in the plans of the Pentagon
that the "New York Times" now brought to light, for the upcoming offensive
against Iraq. According to highly placed sources those plans include the
isolation or assassination of Saddam Hussein. The north-american department
of defense did not comment those plans.

This recent turbulence among the members of the inspection mission
strengthens the tendency of the US and the UK to see with even greater
distrust any involvement of the UN in all of the process leading to the war
against Iraq. Ekéus' revelations thus contribute to the understanding of
Tony Blair's recent positions, stating that an agressions against Iraq does
not need any UN aproval.

RTP Multimédia
2002-07-29 19:37:58"

Note that the original interview which appeared in "Svenska Dagbladet" of
2002-07-29, is not available in english, nor does any part of this
newspaper's website.

Here are some links where this news is to be found:
http://www.unfoundation.org/unwire/2002/07/30/current.asp#27996

http://www.radioleft.com/

apparently this news also appeared on Financial Times, but I couldn't find
it.


So? What do you say about this?
Saddam was telling the truth all along...

What consequences of this do you international law experts withdraw?
Wasn't Iraq in its right to deny access to some facilities?



Miguel Ramos