Saddam says Iraq is not afraid of any threats

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Posted 8:36AM on Tuesday, March 12, 2002

BAGHDAD, Iraq - With speculation growing that Iraq could be the next U.S. target, President Saddam Hussein said his country is unafraid of threats and that he will not enter a dialogue with Kurdish parties in northern Iraq, a newspaper reported Tuesday. Also Tuesday, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz said that Iraq has increased payments to families of Palestinian suicide bombers from $10,000 to $25,000. Saddam has been making such payments since the start of the violence in September 2000. Saddam's comments, quoted in the official al-Iraq newspaper, came as he was receiving members of pro-government Kurdish parties Monday. March 12 is the 32nd anniversary of a peace agreement between Baghdad and the Iraqi Kurds that gave limited autonomy to three northern Iraqi provinces with Kurdish majorities. Speculation has been growing that the U.S military campaign against terrorism will turn next to Iraq. President Bush described Iraq as part of an "axis of evil" and warned Baghdad it would face unspecified consequences if it did not allow U.N. weapons inspectors to resume their task of ensuring Iraq is not stockpiling weapons of mass destruction. Referring to such U.S. comments, Saddam said, "Iraq is not afraid of any threats and will not be affected by evil misdeeds." Force against Iraq may not be the only alternative, Britain's ambassador to the United Nations said in London. Speaking to the British Broadcasting Corp. on Monday, Sir Jeremy Greenstock said Britain still hopes to have Iraq get rid of its weapons of mass destruction peacefully, under U.N. supervision. "We have got to look at the circumstances of whether Iraq poses such a threat and whether there is no other alternative that military action is required and we haven't reached that point," the ambassador said. "We have to see whether the U.N. route, which has recently been reactivated by the Iraqis, may bear some fruit." Saddam dismissed any chance of negotiations now with Kurdish parties in northern Iraq "so that no one comes under the illusion that the latest threats against Iraq have pushed the leadership to talk about dialogue." Two main Kurdish parties, the Kurdish Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, have controlled most of northern Iraq since the United States, Britain and France declared it a haven for the Kurdish minority. Both Kurdish parties are anti-Saddam but have said they will not join a U.S.-led military attack against Baghdad. Aziz said U.S. interests in the Middle East region would be damaged if Iraq is attacked. "The United States knows well that if it wages an aggression on Iraq, then its interests in the Arab world will be threatened by the Arab people, not the regimes," Aziz was quoted as saying by state-run al-Qadissiya newspaper on Tuesday. Aziz was speaking during an Arab conference held in Baghdad in solidarity with Iraq and the Palestinians.