Blix seeks UN role in Iraq

Blix seeks UN role in Iraq

Blix says his mission in Iraq was brought to a premature end

Chief United Nations weapons inspector Hans Blix says his teams could play a key role in helping British and US forces in their search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

In an interview with the BBC, Mr Blix said that although no such weapons had been found, it was still too early to say whether Iraq was free of them.

The statement came as the US military announced the capture of another half-brother of Saddam Hussein.

US Army Brigadier-General Vincent Brooks said Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti was seized by special forces in Baghdad, following a tip-off by Iraqis.

As a former head of Saddam Hussein's intelligence service, Barzan al-Tikriti is said to have been responsible for the murder and torture of thousands of dissidents.

"The capture demonstrates the coalition's commitment to relentlessly pursuing the scattered members of a fractured regime," General Brooks said.

Barzan's brother Watban Ibrahim al-Tikriti was arrested near the Syrian border at the weekend

In other developments:

• French President Jacques Chirac has said it is up to the UN to decide when and how to lift trade sanctions against Iraq, as diplomatic moves intensify over the future of Iraqi oil

• Kurdish officials in northern Iraq say they have discovered at least 2,000 unmarked graves close to an abandoned military camp in the city of Kirkuk

• Three cultural advisers to the White House have resigned, saying US troops should have done more to prevent the looting of museums in Baghdad

• US forces say they should have electricity restored to about half of Baghdad's population by Friday

In his interview with the BBC, Mr Blix acknowledged that the fact that no new weapons of mass destruction had been found so far had made him a little more inclined to believe Iraqi claims that they had no weapons in the first place.

However, he added that view could easily change if some new discovery is made.

The world would like to have a credible report on the absence... of weapons of mass destruction

Hans Blix

BBC UN correspondent Greg Barrow said that Mr Blix has clearly not lost his enthusiasm for finishing the job he started in Iraq.

Mr Blix said his own inspectors had found some evidence that could be the tip of a hidden iceberg of banned weapons, but he added that the same evidence could just be the remnants of an abandoned programme.

With the question of Iraq's remaining weapons still very much open, Mr Blix said he believed there was still a valid role for his inspectors to return to Iraq and examine any discoveries by British and US troops.

"We would be able not only to receive the reports of the Americans and the Brits of what they have found or not found, but we would be able to corroborate a good deal of this," he said.

"I think that the world would like to have a credible report on the absence or eradication of the programme of weapons of mass destruction."

Fugitives

Meanwhile, the United States' defence department says it believes a number of Iraqis on America's most wanted list are now in Syria.

Pentagon officials say up to a dozen Iraqi officials may have crossed the border.

The BBC's Pentagon correspondent, Nick Childs, says US officials believe the Syrian Government is aware of their presence.

It is unclear what the fugitives' precise status is.

So far only a handful of people have been detained from those featured on a US deck of cards picturing 55 wanted Iraqis which was issued last week.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell has said he may soon travel to Damascus.