Additional Al Samoud missiles destroyed, Iraq to report on destruction of banned weapons

Published March 3rd, 2003 - 03:00 GMT

Iraq continued on Monday the process of destroying its Al Samoud 2 missiles under United Nations supervision. Iraq destroyed six more missiles on Monday, bringing the total in three days to 16, all with a bulldozer.

The operation is taking place under UN supervision.

In another development, the United Nations announced Iraq is to produce a report on the quantities of VX nerve gas and anthrax which it claims to have destroyed in 1991. A UN spokesman in Baghdad said the report would be handed over by March 10.

Iraq claimed it had disposed of thousands of tons of chemical and biological weapons after the Gulf War by burying them in the ground.

Meanwhile, Russia has dispatched representatives to the UN Security Council in New York to discuss a role for the Russian military in weapons inspections.

"A team of experts from the foreign and defence ministries flew to New York yesterday to hold consultations on the practical involvement of Russian military in international inspectors' continued monitoring in Iraq," deputy chief of the general staff, General Yury Baluyevsky, told news agencies.

Baluyevskiy went on to say that "the position of Russia on the problem of Iraq remains unchanged - to avert a direct confrontation". "War always entails casualties, including civilian casualties," he said. Replying to a question about the timetable for a detachment of Russian warships being sent to the Indian Ocean, Baluyevskiy said: "Exercises of Pacific Fleet warships will take place in the zone of their responsibility in August." (Albawaba.com)