The US has drafted a new United Nations resolution which demands that Iraq to give details of its weapons programmes within days of a vote, or face a possible military attack.
Under the proposed resolution, which will be put to the UN Security Council next week, Iraq faces two deadlines. It has seven days to accept the resolution's demands and 30 days to declare any weapons it may possess.
The essence of the plan is to be presented by US and British officials to France, Russia and China - the other permanent members of the UN Security Council, all of whom have powers to veto any new UN resolution on Iraq. Paris, Moscow and Beijing are all resisting the US and British push for military strikes against Baghdad.
Baghdad has 23 days to open up the sites concerned and provide all documents to support the declaration, a US official told the paper.
Iraq will also have to provide a full account of its programs to develop weapons of mass destruction before the inspectors return to the country.
Inspections will be intrusive, possibly with military guards, and will occur at any site in Iraq the inspectors want to see, it said.
Restrictions on inspections at Iraq's eight presidential sites, which UN Secretary General Kofi Annan agreed to in 1998, will be repealed.
The US and the four other permanent members of the Security Council will have the right to send representatives along with the inspection teams, the draft says.
If Baghdad fails to comply with the inspection demands, "all necessary means to restore international peace and security", including military action, will be justified, it concludes.
"If we find anything in what they give us that is not true, that is the trigger," an American official told the newspaper.
"If they delay, obstruct or lie about anything they disclosed, then this will trigger action."
Officials familiar with the document told the Times the draft resolution said Iraq was already guilty of a "material breach" of past UN resolutions on disarmament because it was developing weapons of mass destruction and had tried to frustrate the work of inspectors.
AFP