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CNN LIVE AT DAYBREAK

No Comment Yet From Iraq on CBS Interview

Aired February 26, 2003 - 06:03   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: As all of the rhetoric continues to fly, Iraq is finding more bombs, even documents that tell of destruction of weapons. Evidence of cooperation or not?
We take you live to the center of the controversy, Baghdad, and Rym Brahimi.

Bring us up to date -- Rym.

RYM BRAHIMI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

Well, a couple of things. First of all, the Al Samoud missile. This is, of course, the hot issue of the moment. Iraq, as you mentioned, has until the weekend to begin destruction of those Al Samoud 2 missiles if it wants to be complying with requests by the U.N. inspectors.

Now, President Saddam Hussein talking to CBS said a couple of things. He said first of all: "Our commitment is to abide, to comply with the resolution and to apply it as per the will of the United Nations. And on that basis, we have acted and we shall act."

Asked again by the interviewer, Dan Rather of CBS, whether he was going to destroy those missiles or not, the president said, "We have no missiles outside the specifications of the United Nations."

So, basically, we're still waiting for that answer. That didn't really clarify much. But the president is saying as Iraq has been saying that their missiles do not exceed the range.

Now, meanwhile, other officials are saying that they are studying that request. The U.N. says there is no margin for maneuver, the Al Samoud missiles were studied by a panel of experts, and they have to be destroyed.

Back to you.

COSTELLO: Rym, tell us some more about this new weapon that was apparently found, this chemical warhead possibly, and these documents that Iraq suddenly found that described destruction of weapons of mass destruction.

BRAHIMI: Well, as you know, during Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei's last visit, Iraq agreed to form a commission of experts to try and find more documents and more weapons -- possible weapons of mass destruction that may have been left and present them to the inspectors as part of their -- of what has been required from them, the proactive cooperation. So, they found something.

They've also been excavating in areas, trying to prove to the U.N. that this is where they had unilaterally destroyed some weapons some years ago. And of course, a number of letters have gone to Hans Blix. Mr. Blix says it is positive for now those letters presenting more documents, presenting more evidence, but he says he wants to see the bigger picture for now.

Back to you.

COSTELLO: Understand. Rym Brahimi reporting live from Baghdad.

And, of course, those Al Samoud 2 missiles must be destroyed by Saturday. We'll see what happens.

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