SPACE WIRE
Carter 'completely in agreement' with Bush UN approach to Iraq
OSLO (AFP) Dec 09, 2002
Former US president and this year's Nobel Peace Prize winner Jimmy Carter, a regular critic of the US government's Iraq policy, on Monday said he could no longer fault the Bush administration since it had decided to channel its efforts through the United Nations.

Addressing a news conference on the eve of the Nobel Prize awards ceremony here, Carter also said that Iraq seemed to be in compliance with UN demands.

"I'm completely in agreement with the decision to go to the United Nations Security Council, to seek the pre-emptive and unimpeded inspection of all the suspected sites in Iraq by the inspection committee, a concentration on the purpose of removing all weapons of mass destruction and cooperating with as many other nations on earth as possible," Carter said.

Carter's criticism of the Bush administration's foreign policy, especially towards Iraq, had gained wide currency since he was named Peace Prize winner in October.

At the time, Nobel committee chairman Gunnar Berge sparked controversy by saying that the judges' choice "can and must be interpreted as a criticism of the position of the administration currently sitting in the US towards Iraq".

However, since then the US administration has decided to approach the Iraqi question through the UN, causing Carter to soften his tone.

"What I interpret as the official decisions of our government is completely compatible, at least at this point, with what I have proposed for the last three or four months," he said.

Carter said he did not have access to US intelligence reports but, on the basis of available information, Iraq had not violated any UN resolutions.

"At this point in my opinion Iraq has complied," he said.

"If there is compliance, as judged by the UN Security Council, then I see no reason for armed conflict," Carter said, but cautioned that there must be complete removal all weapons of mass destruction.

"Otherwise I think it is quite likely that there will be armed conflict," he said.

Carter rejected any notion that oil interests may prompt a decision by the US to go to war with Iraq.

"I think that anyone who claims that the United States is trying to get cheap oil, or free oil, by invading Iraq is foolish," Carter said.

"We can buy oil, at a reasonable price of about 27 dollars a barrel, much less expensively than we can invade a country with its enormous cost," he said.

According to a recent survey published by the New York Times, most Europeans believe that any war with Iraq would be waged for control of that country's oil reserves, but only a minority of Americans concur.

Carter, who won the prize for years of efforts as international mediator, will receive the award and a prize sum of 10 million kronor (1.1 million euros/dollars) at Oslo's City Hall on Tuesday.

The Nobel distinction came as a surprise to both himself and his countrymen, Carter said at the news conference, but he expected it to contribute to a more favourable assessment of his 1976-1980 presidency, which was dogged by economic troubles and the Iran hostage crisis.

"I think the prize will shift attention to the more favourable things and maybe away from some of the things that were not so favourable."

He also said he expected the prize to make it easier for the Carter Center, which he founded 20 years ago to promote peace and fight diseases, to raise funds.

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