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Russia will insist on United Nations (UN) arms inspectors declaring Iraq free of weapons of mass destruction before sanctions against it can be lifted, Itar-Tass news agency quoted a senior foreign ministry official as saying Monday.
The unnamed official said chief weapons inspectors Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei, who headed UN inspections in Iraq prior to the US-led war, should be allowed to return and quickly finish their work.
"This could be done within a couple of weeks as it is obvious that there are no such weapons there," the official told Itar-Tass.
Russia, which has veto power on the UN Security Council, has turned down Washington's requests for an immediate lifting of economic sanctions against Baghdad after troops toppled the government of President Saddam Hussein.
UN resolutions link the lifting of sanctions, imposed after Iraq's 1990 invasion of neighboring Kuwait, to the country being certified free of weapons of mass destruction.
(China Daily April 22, 2003)
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