Blair: US, Britain Won't Have to Act Alone on Iraq

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, October 10, 2002

Blair: US, Britain Won't Have to Act Alone on Iraq

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British Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Wednesday that Britain and the United States will probably not be forced to invade Iraq without United Nations backing, arguing that the international community would likely support efforts to disarm Saddam Hussein.

"I don't believe we'll be in the position where we're taking this action alone because I think we've got a perfectly reasonable proposition. We've made it clear this issue must be dealt with and we, Britain, are determined that it shall be dealt with," Blair told BBC's World Service radio.

"It is best dealt with through the U.N., through the international community making its will clear and Saddam then complying with that will. But nobody should be in any doubt that if it isn't dealt with in that way it's got to be dealt with differently," he said.

Blair said that war with Iraq was not inevitable, but Saddam's disarmament was.

"The only way of avoiding conflict is that you have the weapons inspectors go back into Iraq and do their job properly. If Saddam does what the international community has required him to do, if he makes it clear that he's prepared to cooperate and the inspectors disarm him of these weapons then there'll be no conflict," Blair continued.

Blair also insisted that the United Nations must pass a strong new resolution to express the will of the international community and lay down rules for new weapons inspections.

"We have to make sure that ... the system underneath which the inspectors do their work takes account of and removes the difficulties from before," he argued.

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