UK looks at Iraq weapons deadline

Saddam: The British government may ask for him to be set a time limit to allow resumption of U.N.arms inspections

LONDON, England -- Britain says it may consider pressing for a deadline for Iraq to comply with United Nations resolutions on weapons inspections.

Ministers were prepared to consider a call by parliament's foreign affairs committee to propose a deadline for the Iraqi dictator to comply with U.N. Security Council resolutions on weapons inspections, the UK government said.

The British Foreign Office said in a statement: "Existing U.N. resolutions require immediate Iraqi compliance including on weapons inspections. The government will nonetheless be giving further consideration to this recommendation."

The deadline would apply to Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programmes.

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It was not immediately clear why the Foreign Office -- the ministerial department of UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw -- waited more than eight weeks to respond publicly to the committee's recommendation.

But the suggestion comes as British officials seek to play down suggestions of a rift with the United States over military action against Iraq.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair came under fresh pressure on Tuesday to make his position clear on the Iraq issue after U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney firmly set out Washington's case for military action.

Blair is facing a major revolt within his ruling Labour Party over his support for U.S. threats of action against Iraq, according to a new opinion poll.

The ICM poll published in Wednesday's Guardian newspaper showed that 52 percent of Labour supporters believed Britain did not support any military action against Iraq.

Britain and the United States have accused Iraq of trying to acquire weapons of mass destruction in violation of U.N. resolutions imposed after the Gulf War.

Iraq says it has dismantled all such programmes and wants an end to punitive U.N. sanctions. It has refused to allow U.N. weapons inspectors into the country since a U.S.-British bombing campaign in December 1998.

The report also rejected criticisms that Britain's intelligence agencies -- MI6, MI5 and GCHQ -- could have done more to avert the September 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

"The Government does not accept that the UK agencies overlooked any intelligence which would have forewarned of the attacks of last September," it said.

"A subsequent re-examination of material across the intelligence community did not find any information that could have given warning of the attacks."

The Parliamentary Intelligence Committee disclosed earlier this year that British and U.S. intelligence had been aware in the run up to September 11 that Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network was planning an attack but did not know the target.

The committee criticised the agencies for failing to do more to find out what was going on.