President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt warned Iraq yesterday that it could face "a massacre" if it continued to defy the UN over weapons inspections. After meeting the Iraqi Foreign Minister, Mr Mohammed Saeed al Sahaf, in the Egyptian capital Mr Mubarak said: "I have talked to the Iraqi foreign minister and told him that the situation is dangerous, and it is important to implement Security Council resolutions to avoid a crisis." Mr Al Sahaf, in Egypt as part of a regional tour to raise support for a compromise over the inspections, struck a conciliatory tone, saying that Iraq is "doing everything to make sure political and diplomatic efforts succeed in averting a military clash".
However, he said he did not understand Washington's continued threats of a military action after Baghdad promised to give UN inspectors enough time to look for banned weapons in all the disputed sites.
He said Iraq would open all eight of its "presidential" sites to UN inspectors for up to two months. If Washington rejected that proposal, he said, it was going against the "will of the majority".
However, the US and Britain have rejected the plan. "It's not up to Iraq to set the conditions for those inspections. It's up to the United Nations to do the work as the United Nations sees fit," the White House press secretary, Mr Mike McCurry, said.
Earlier, in Baghdad the Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Tariq Aziz, said Iraq was ready to open the eight presidential sites for inspection for 60 days under the supervision of the UN Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, and the Security Council.
However, in Washington President Clinton insisted that Baghdad must give UN inspectors "full and free" access to suspected weapons sites.