Teams of UN arms inspectors resumed their hunt for banned weapons in Iraq on Saturday after winning promises of secret data supplied by Western intelligence agencies even as Washington and London signalled the prospect of a ground and air war in early 2003. President George W. Bush cancelled a trip to Africa at a few weeks’ notice while the US military forged ahead with a buildup that could have more than 100,000 troops in the Gulf region in January or February. Prime Minister Tony Blair told British armed forces in a Christmas message to prepare for war. In a brief White House appearance on Friday, Bush said Iraq’s arms declaration was ‘‘not encouraging’’ for finding a peaceful solution to the standoff. Hans Blix, head of the team of UN inspectors that returned to Iraq in November after a four-year hiatus had urged Washington and London to share intelligence. But there was no indication early on Saturday that the data had yet been provided. Officials said the information would involve fewer than six sites where US Intelligence believed Iraq has ‘‘suspicious chemical weapons or elements of production.’’ In New York, UN Security Council members agreed to appoint Germany as chairman of the council’s sanctions panel on Iraq after the White House dropped its opposition, diplomats said. The Security Council asked the arms inspectors on Friday to provide a detailed assessment of Iraq’s arms declaration on January 9, in another effort to evaluate Baghdad’s claim it no longer has weapons of mass destruction. Speculations are rife that Blix may appear before the Security Council again on January 27. In Qatar on Saturday, six Gulf Arab member nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) began a summit meeting that could create rifts within the pro-Western alliance. Speaking in Doha on Friday, Washington’s top military commander, General Richard Myers, said the US would go on deploying more forces to the Gulf. There are now 60,000 US troops in the region, more than half of them Navy and Air Force, and some 50,000 US Ground troops were being told this week to get ready to move to the Gulf. (Reuters)
