President Saddam Hussein has said the Iraqi people should welcome the UN arms inspectors.
The Iraqi leader contradicted his vice president, who last night accused the international monitors of being US and Israeli spies.
Mr Taha Yassin Ramadan also accused the inspectors of staging the intrusion into a presidential palace as a provocation that could lead to war. "Their work is to spy to serve the CIA and Mossad," he said.
But in a holiday greeting to his Ba'ath party, Saddam said the inspections were a welcome opportunity to disprove US allegations that his government is making such weapons. He said he had agreed to the checks, in which one of his own palaces was searched, "to keep our people out of harm's way" in the face of US threats. He denounced Washington as an "unjust, arrogant, debased American tyranny".
Turning to US weapons claims, he said Iraqis wanted to disprove those allegations after the four year absence of UN arms inspectors.
But US President George W. Bush has said Saddam "is not somebody who looks like he is interested in complying.
"We expect him to disarm, and now it is up to him to do so," he said. "Anybody who shoots at US airplanes or British airplanes is not somebody who looks like he's interested in complying with disarmament".
Iraq is required by the UN Security Council to hand over a list by Sunday of any weapons of mass destruction it has, as well as a description of any long-range missile programmes.
A UN spokesman defended its inspectors from claims that said they were US and Israeli spies.
The inspectors have suspended searches for today and tomorrow because of a Muslim holy period. Inspections will resume on Saturday.
The team of weapons experts are finishing their first week back in Iraq, where they are hunting for evidence of programmes to develop biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.
The UN Security Council also extended the UN oil-for-food humanitarian program in Iraq for six months and agreed to review within 30 days a list of goods that Baghdad needs approval to import. The United States dropped its demand for only a two-week extension at the insistence of the other 14 council members.