With U.S. President George W. Bush ratcheting up American rhetoric against Iraq's Saddam Hussein, attention is focusing on the alleged sales of arms systems to Baghdad by Ukraine and Belarus. As RFE/RL correspondent Jeffrey Donovan reports, the systems could help shoot down U.S. and British warplanes patrolling the "no-fly" zones over Iraq, as well as be used during any future military showdown with Saddam.
Washington, 14 March 2002 (RFE/RL) -- Allegations have surfaced that Ukraine and Belarus sold Iraqi President Saddam Hussein anti-aircraft systems and trained Baghdad's forces to use the weapons, in violation of United Nations sanctions.
The U.S. State Department, which recently threatened sanctions against Minsk for alleged illicit arms transfers to rogue states, says Washington has credible evidence that a group of Iraqi officers were in Belarus last fall to be trained to use the S-300 anti-aircraft system against British and U.S. jets patrolling the "no-fly" zones over Iraq.
The training, according to Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Steven Pifer, took place after the September terrorist attacks against the U.S. and President Bush's subsequent edict that America will not differentiate between terrorists and the nations that sponsor them.
Pifer traveled to Minsk in late February to voice U.S. concerns over reports that some Belarusian arms exports violated UN sanctions or ended up in the hands of terrorists or of states suspected of supporting them, such as Iraq. Pifer made this observation in an interview this week with RFE/RL: "In the fall, there was a group of Iraqis in Belarus being trained on how to operate the S-300 surface-to-air missile system. This is a very advanced anti-aircraft system, and there's only one reason that the Iraqis would want to have that system and people trained to operate it, [and] that is to shoot down American aircraft and British aircraft that are flying over Iraq now."
The American charges, which Belarus has repeatedly denied, come as the U.S. is reportedly considering military action against Iraq as part of the next phase in the war against terrorism. Washington fears Baghdad may be seeking to develop chemical, biological or nuclear weapons of mass destruction -- and possibly transfer them to Islamic militants for use against U.S. or other Western targets.
Yesterday, Bush ratcheted up American rhetoric against Baghdad, telling a White House news conference that he is deeply concerned about Iraq -- "a nation run by a man who is willing to kill his own people" -- and calling Saddam "a problem" that America is going to deal with.
Minsk is not alone in being implicated in an arms dispute. Yesterday, a leading Ukrainian parliamentarian accused President Leonid Kuchma of coordinating the sale of an S-300 air defense system to Iraq in the summer of 2000.
It seems people just use religion anyhow nowadays. 
