"No Question" Iraq has Transferred Weapons to Syria: Netanyahu

Jan. 19, 2003

JERUSALEM, Jan 19 (AFP) - Israeli Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday there was "no question" Iraq had transferred banned weapons to neighboring Syria.

"There is no question Iraq has transferred materials to Syria," Netanyahu said in an interview with CNN's "Late Edition," when asked what information Israel possessed on the alleged transfers.

Asked what weapons Iraq had sent, Netanyahu said: "obviously material that is sufficiently important for Iraq to move into Syria, either because it does want this to be found, or because it wants to have (them) in reserve."

He said this was "one of several possibilities: but none are good."

"There is obviously some very close cooperation going on between Saddam Hussein and the regime in Damascus," he added.

Netanyahu was repeating allegations made by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in December that Israel had information Iraq had recently transferred chemical or biological weapons into Syria to hide them.

Syria dismissed the allegations as "laughable."

UN arms experts have been hunting for banned weapons of mass destruction in Iraq since late November, and are due to present a key status report on Iraq's cooperation to the UN Security Council on January 27.

Netanyahu also said it was a question of time before Iraqi President Saddam Hussein developed nuclear weapons.

"We know it is just a question of time before he acquires nuclear weapons, we know he might use those weapons, or use them as an umbrella for al-Qaeda type operations," he said, referring to the Islamist terror group headed by Osama bin Laden.

On the Palestinian-Israeli front, Netanyahu said the peaceful departure of Saddam, or his ouster by a military attack, would benefit the defunct peace process.

"I am very hopeful," the departure of Saddam will send "positive seismic shock waves to the Middle East", because it would show dictators that practice terror have no place in politics, he said.

He did not mention Yasser Arafat by name, but made a veiled call for a replacement of the veteran Palestinian leader.

He added that if economic and political reforms were applied vis-a-vis the Palestinians, "it will produce a positive, and more responsible leadership with whom we can make peace."

http://www.ptd.net/webnews/wed/bv/Qisrael-iraq-un-syria.R5Gg_DJJ.html