RUSSIA: Russia rejected British and US plans for Iraq yesterday. President Vladimir Putin told the visiting British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, that UN sanctions against Baghdad should remain until the search for Iraq's alleged cache of weapons of mass destruction was complete.
A tense atmosphere between the two leaders underlined the diplomatic damage done by the war in Iraq, which Russia opposed, along with France and Germany.
"Where is Saddam? Where is this arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, if it ever existed? Maybe Saddam is sitting somewhere in a secret bunker with weapons of mass destruction, preparing to explode all this stuff and threaten thousands of human lives," Mr Putin said ironically as Mr Blair looked on.
"Or maybe he transferred it, or plans to transfer it, to terrorist organisations. We need answers to these questions," Mr Putin told reporters after talks with the British leader.
The men met in the garden of Mr Putin's dacha, shook hands and then engaged in a brief, hesitant hug that set the tone for a tricky afternoon meeting.
Mr Blair requested the talks, the Kremlin said, in the hope of healing a rift between UN Security Council members that widened as war raged and could now hamper the plans for rebuilding Iraq that Washington drew up and London broadly backs.
Moscow and Paris support only the partial lifting of 12-year-old sanctions against the devastated country.
The only leverage they have over Iraq's future lies with their Security Council vetoes, which could block the US push for an immediate return to full trade with Iraq, a move that Russia and France fear could see US oil corporations squeeze their companies out of the dash to pump Iraqi oil back on to the world market.
Mr Putin was adamant yesterday the UN had to play the key role in ending sanctions and rebuilding Iraq, and insisted that the Iraqi people - not politicians in Washington or London - had to shape their own future.
"Sanctions were imposed on Iraq on the basis of suspicions that it held weapons of mass destruction," he said. "Sanctions can only be removed if there is no suspicion, and only the Security Council can remove these sanctions because it imposed them in the first place.
"And if something is found, there's no need to just show us empty barrels on television," he added. "UN inspectors could be immediately summoned to draw their professional conclusions."
Mr Blair, insisting the talks had been conducted in "a constructive and immensely friendly atmosphere", said he was still convinced that Saddam Hussein's regime had been a genuine danger to global security.
"Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and has been pursuing a programme for weapons of mass destruction over a long period of time," he said, while agreeing that discoveries of such weapons had to be "independently verified".
The British leader again shied away from supporting the "central role" for the UN in Iraq that Russia, France and Germany want, insisting rather that it should play "an important role in solving humanitarian problems, and in the economic rebuilding" of the country.
Mr Putin also criticised US calls to scrap the UN oil-for-food programme in Iraq, a system that has earned Russian firms billions of dollars over the last decade, but said Moscow was willing to discuss restructuring the $8 billion owed to it by Baghdad.