Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, September 16, 2002
US Helps Iraq Build Biological Weapons in 1980s: Newsweek
The United States provided Iraq with assistance to build biological weapons in the 1980s whenIraq and Iran were at war, Newsweek magazine reported in a cover story on Sunday.
The United States provided Iraq with assistance to build biological weapons in the 1980s whenIraq and Iran were at war, Newsweek magazine reported in a cover story on Sunday.
During the 1980s, when Iraq was at war with Iran, the United States decided to help Iraq and began supplying Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein with supplies and military hardware, including shipments of "bacteria/fungi/protozoa" to the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission, the widely-circulated magazine quoted US officials as saying.
Senior US officials told the magazine that Washington is worrying that Iraq now could use its biological weapons against the US in case of a US military strike against the country.
The development of weapons of mass destruction has been the major pretext which the Bush administration uses to justify a possible military strike against Baghdad.
Speaking in Camp David, Maryland, on Saturday, President GeorgeW. Bush again urged the United Nations to act quickly to enforce Iraq's compliance with UN resolutions on disarmament, saying that the US would otherwise act alone.