Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 18, 1991 TAG: 9104180561
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
Presidential spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said that leaders of France, Britain and Turkey did not pressure President Bush into moving to commit land forces to set up camps for Kurdish refugees in northern Iraq.
"We see it as a continuation" of the U.S. relief effort that began a week and a half ago with an airdrop, Fitzwater told reporters today.
"There is no doubt that the French and the British wanted to do something," Fitzwater said. But he disputed news accounts suggesting that Bush had widened the U.S. commitment essentially at the behest of these allies.
In fact, Fitzwater said, British Prime Minister John Major and French President Francois Mitterrand "were amazed at the size of the plan. They hadn't considered anything so large."
U.S. troops entered northern Iraq on Wednesday on their new mission to establish and guard aid camps for Kurdish refugees. A U.S. force of at least 5,000 troops was expected to participate.
U.N. Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar has expressed misgivings over the operation and raised questions about whether the United States had legal authority to set up the camps, saying Iraq's assent would be required. But Fitzwater disagreed. He said U.N. Resolution 688, which authorized the international relief effort for the refugees inside their own country, "provides full authority."
And U.S. lawmakers have said the plan fails to address the longer-term question of whether stability ever can be restored while Saddam Hussein holds power.
Members of Congress said the United States and its allies may be in for a longer involvement than they had hoped.
"It's a quagmire," said Rep. Vic Fazio, D-Calif., who repeated charges that the administration lured the Kurds into their present plight by encouraging a revolt. "But at the same time, it's the only thing we can do now to have a humane approach."
Bush, meantime, warned Iraq that it must allow the relief effort to go forward "peacefully and harmoniously" before it can expect an end to the economic sanctions imposed after it invaded Kuwait last August.
"What comes first is taking care of these people that have been deprived of their homes and that are terrified and also that are suffering very much," the president said.
Capitol Hill became a fount of advice for Bush this week after the administration's initial stumble in recognizing and acting on the Iraqi refugee crisis. Approval of aid for the refugees was virtually unanimous, but many were saying also that Saddam must go.
Helicopters carried the first wave of what was expected to be several thousand U.S. troops into northern Iraq on Wednesday to begin scouting sites for the refugee camps. Pentagon spokesman Pete Williams said construction would begin within a few days and that the first refugees would be moved in within two weeks.
The refugee centers, in the vicinity of the Iraqi towns of Zakhu and Dihok, are be to surrounded by satellite camps where at least 400,000 Kurdish refugees will be invited to settle to obtain food, shelter and medical care.
As many as 1.5 million refugees who fled Saddam's troops have become mired in the mountainous border area with Turkey and Iran, and they are dying of starvation, exposure and disease at a rate of up to 1,000 a day.
At the same time, Williams said, an Army and Marine Corps reaction force will set up a base at an undisclosed spot inside Turkey and will stand by in case Iraqi troops seek to interfere with the relief effort. Defense sources said the force would number at least 5,000.
And Bush held up continued international economic sanctions on Iraq as leverage to ensure that Baghdad allows the relief effort to go forward.
by CNB