Inexperience marks team of inspectors

And while the geographic distribution within UNMOVIC is indeed broad, it's not broad enough for some.

The Arab League last week called for greater inclusion of Arab inspectors. Yahya Mahmassani, the Arab League's permanent observer to the UN, sent a letter to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan this week, calling for "fairness."

"For the moment, there are only a couple of Arab inspectors; I think you can count one, two, or three," says Mr. Mahmassani. "We believe it's only fair that since Arab states are a large proportion of the UN, and where these inspectors are going is to an Arab region ... that qualified, competent Arab inspectors be included. If inspections were taking place somewhere in South America, the Latin Americans would probably be asking for the same thing."

But others note that the International Atomic Energy Agency's director general is Mohamed El Baradei, an Egyptian. He arrives in Baghdad Monday to take charge of inspecting suspected nuclear weapons sites.

The country of origin may be a factor in other ways. Making all inspectors salaried UN employees is supposed to make them less vulnerable to pressure from their home countries. But critics wonder if that will work.

"In my experience, even though we were all nominally on loan and supposed to be representing the interests of the UN, not our national interests, the reality was that the inspectors tended to represent the general approach of our respective counties," says Mr. Tucker, a senior fellow at the US Institute of Peace who served a stint with the UN in Iraq in 1995. "The French and Russians tended to give the Iraqis the benefit of the doubt, whereas the Americans and British were much more skeptical of Iraqi statements and behavior."

UNMOVIC officials would not confirm the nationalities of its inspectors. Some media reports say that 27 are from the US, 13 from Britain, 22 from Russia, and 25 from France.

Before landing in Iraq, says Mr. Buchanan, UNMOVIC inspectors, unlike their UNSCOM forerunners, will have undergone at least five weeks of training, that included the rules guiding their mission, the history of Iraq's weapons programs, and the culture of Iraq.

Inspectors include experts in such areas as molecular pharmacology, microbiology, and missile design. But there will also be lab technicians, engineers, and logistical support. "It's not just nukes, chemicals, bugs, and missiles," says Jon Wolfsthal, deputy director of the Nonproliferation Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. "You don't need to be an expert in biological weapons to be useful. As long as they're trained, competent, and have the necessary experience, then it doesn't matter if inspectors are American or Armenian. As long as they get the job done."

UNMOVIC inspectors do have some important advantages that may compensate for the lack of experience. For example, they will have better equipment than their predecessors, allowing them to test suspected sites for biological and chemical toxins on the spot.

And this time, no presidential palaces or personnel are off limits to inspectors. In an interview with the French newspaper Le Monde on Friday, chief UN inspector Hans Blix said that even a delay of 30 minutes in granting inspectors access to a site would be considered a serious violation.

The Bush administration says it's unconcerned by the composition and experience of inspection teams. "We're confident, based on what we've heard from Dr. Blix, that they have the tools to do their job; they just need the access to do it and cooperation of Iraqis," says a Bush administration official.

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