Blix Felt U.S. Intimidating Him Before Iraq War

[Kellanved]

VIENNA (Reuters) - Former chief U.N. arms inspector Hans Blix felt Washington was intimidating him to produce reports that would justify military action in the run-up to the Iraq (news - web sites) war, the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog said on Friday.

...
"I think there were probably more efforts to intimidate Hans Blix, because there were more serious concerns about chemical and biological (weapons)," he (ElBaradei )said.
"Hans complained a lot about the media campaign, some of the administration's efforts to put pressure on him."

...
The Bush administration sharply criticized Blix before the war for refusing to back U.S. and British assertions about Iraq's weapons programs in his reports to the U.N. Security Council.


U.N. weapons inspectors never found the massive stockpiles of banned weapons that Britain and the U.S. claimed President Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) possessed. Neither have the U.S. and British forces who took over the hunt for his arsenal after the war.

...

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20030829/pl_nm/iraq_elbaradei_dc&cid=615&ncid=1473

[0007]

1. I hope Blix doesn't take this personally

.........but intimidating, trashing, smearing, lying and timely deaths is all part of the GOP's game plan.

Edited to add: bribing & scaring & waving American flags & going to a christian chruch should be interjected
between lying and timely deaths above.

[bowens43]

2. I'm surprised

he didn't have an 'accident'.

[rooboy]

5. No wonder Swedes drive Volvos... n/t

[NNN0LHI]

3. This is shocking, I tell you. Shocking! n/t

[Kellanved]

4. there was a Guardian article about this in june

It's ugly...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,974998,00.html

[mjb4]

6. Blix was being evasive and allowed this war

to procede. His language was not helpful

[MoonAndSun]

7. I agree with you, mjb4...

Blix's language was so convoluted whenever he gave his updates on the weapons' inspections that the average viewer did not understand what he was trying to say. His diplomatic way of reading his reports did the anit-war movement no favors.

He is to blame in some respects, but of course the main blame lies with bush* and his evil cabal.

[jamesinca]

8. I have to disagree

His reports were to the U.N. and to heads of state. They were the ones making the decisions. If he was giving reports to the populace of the world so they could vote on it, then I could see him using different language. He was addressing a body of politicians, not the world populace. I would blame the WH and the news media for not translating it truthfully so we could understand it.