UN weapons experts inspected a military industrial complex and a suspected missile site outside Baghdad today as arms inspections in Iraq resumed after a one-day break.
A group of inspectors drove from their headquarters in Baghdad to the complex run by the Public Company of the Mother of All Battles in Yusoufiyyah area some 10 miles south of the capital.
The company, whose title incorporates the name used by Iraq to describe the 1991 Gulf War over Kuwait, is an arm of the state's Military Industrialisation Commission in charge of developing weapons.
Another group of inspectors drove to a suspected missile site at Balad, 48 miles north of Baghdad. The town is almost halfway between Baghdad and Tikrit, the birthplace of President Saddam Hussein.
Both groups were accompanied by Iraqi officials but journalists were barred .
The inspectors, who carry out unannounced visits, did not work yesterday, the Muslim holy day. They had visited five sites on the first two days back at work and reported that inspections had gone smoothly.
But an Iraqi official newspaper today denounced UN demands that Baghdad produce a full account of its arms programme by December 8th.
"It is quite clear that this paragraph explicitly accuses Iraq of possessing weapons of mass destruction," al-Jumhouriyasaid in a front-page editorial.
"It also casts doubts about Iraq's sincere cooperation with UN Security Council resolutions," it added.
With the December 8 deadline approaching, Washington announced that one of its top diplomats would visit eight European countries and Turkey next week to consult on Iraq.
Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman will visit NATO offices in Brussels, Britain and Turkey between December 1st and 3rd as part of a delegation led by Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, the State Department said in a statement yesterday.
Mr Wolfowitz will return to Washington from Ankara while Mr Grossman, who ranks third in the State Department hierarchy, will travel on to Cyprus, Greece, Germany, the Netherlands, France and Portugal on December 6th.