White House optimistic over U.N. Iraq resolution
Russia, France withholding veto threat
From Suzanne Malveaux
CNN
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Bush administration expressed optimism after six weeks of struggle with the United Nations over language in the U.N. Security Council's resolution to disarm Iraq.
"We are encouraged that we are getting closer to agreement," a senior administration official said late Monday. White House aides are hopeful that a vote on the U.S.-drafted U.N. resolution may come as early as the end of this week.
The senior official said he was encouraged when Hans Blix, U.N. chief weapons inspector, and Mohammed Elbaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, expressed support for some disputed language that the White House insists must stay.
Blix said he supported "serious consequences" for Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein if he did not comply with weapons inspections. Elbaradei said he had no problem if the statement were to remain that Iraq was in "material breach" of previous U.N. resolutions that it has ignored. These phrases have been of particular concern to Security Council members who see the language as supporting an opening for the United States to attack Iraq on its own.
A second senior administration official said another good sign that agreement may be reached is that neither Russia nor France, both with veto power, has threatened to veto the U.S. draft of the resolution. "If they were serious about it, they would have done so," the official said.
Russia and France have not formally introduced their alternative draft resolutions.
"There is circulating your draft, as in capital 'C', and there is circulating your draft, as in small 'c'. They are circulating their drafts, as in small 'c,'" the senior administration official said. "There is a very big difference."
The United States officially circulated its draft last week to the Security Council after weeks of informally passing around its proposal. It was "put into blue," as U.N. members like to say, a reference to the blue ink used for official documents.
