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Blix: Iraqis have found more warheadsTop inspectors meet with Iraqi officials
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi officials said they have found four more empty chemical warheads similar to 12 others found last week, the U.N.'s chief weapons inspector said Sunday. Hans Blix, in Baghdad with top nuclear weapons inspector Mohamed ElBaradei, said on CNN's "Late Edition" that the 12 empty warheads were on the agenda for talks Sunday with Iraqi officials. "They said they had been surprised themselves" about finding the empty warheads, Blix said. "They were in boxes, never opened -- there were bird droppings on them. But of course they should have been declared and destroyed." The discovery of four more such warheads -- and the potential to discover more -- raise the question of whether they are "remnants of the past [or] the tip of an iceberg," Blix said. White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said Iraq's discovery of the warheads "should not be mistaken for genuine cooperation in an effort to disarm." "[The United Nations] has found that Iraq has failed to account for nearly 30,000 shells for chemical agents," Stanzel said. "Bringing forward four is hardly evidence of a good-faith effort, but it is further evidence that Iraq continues to have proscribed materials." Thursday, U.N. inspectors found 12 empty chemical warheads they said should have been declared by the Iraqis. Inspectors returned Saturday to the Ukhaider ammunition storage area, about 150 kilometers (93 miles) southwest of Baghdad, where they did further tests on the warheads, according to the United Nations. Also last week, inspectors found nearly 3,000 pages of documents in Arabic that "appear to be related to laser-enrichment technology" at the home of an Iraqi scientist, ElBaradei said. (Full story) The documents were being analyzed by U.N. experts Sunday. "When we find material for chemical ammunition, we have to ask ourselves, "Is this just one find or are there more?'" Blix said. "When we find documents at a private house, we must ask ourselves, 'Are there more when they say there are no more documents?'" After meeting Sunday with Iraqi officials, ElBaradei said, "I think we are making some progress," The Associated Press reported. ElBaradei did not elaborate, and Iraqi officials declined to comment, the AP reported. Another meeting is set for Monday. Blix and ElBaradei are due to present a status report on the inspections to the U.N. Security Council on January 27. Bush administration officials backed up the arrival of Blix and ElBaradei with a strong message to Baghdad. "The record so far is not a good record, and they have very little time left to make it a good record," Secretary of State Colin Powell said on CNN's "Late Edition." "If you say you're clean, then come clean. Time is running out. We can't keep hunting and pecking and trying to see if we can find something." Powell met Sunday with the foreign ministers of France, Mexico and China to discuss what the next steps should be with Iraq and the impending report from weapons inspectors. (Full story) Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Sunday that exile for Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and other members of the Iraqi leadership would be a "fair trade" to avoid a military conflict. (Full story) -- CNN correspondents Nic Robertson and Rym Brahimi contributed to this report. Copyright 2003 CNN. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report.
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