U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday defended the U.S.-led war on Iraq in 2003, shrugging off allegations by a former White House press secretary that U.S. President George W. Bush misled Americans into war.
Asked how the United States can lead an international consensus on rebuilding Iraq in the context of charges by Scott McClellan, Rice said she would not comment on a book that she has not read.
But she said the case for war was clear.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice speaks during a meeting with Iraqi government leaders in Baghdad April 20, 2008. "The concerns about weapons of mass destruction in Saddam Hussein's Iraq were the fundamental reasons for dozens of resolutions within the (UN) Security Council from the time that Saddam was expelled from Kuwait in 1991 up until 2003," Rice told reporters after a meeting with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt.
Rice is in Stockholm for an international conference on Iraq.
"It was not the United States of America alone that believed that he had weapons of mass destruction, that he was hiding weapons of mass destruction that led him to throw (UN) inspectors out effectively, leading the Clinton administration to take military action against Iraq," Rice said.
"It was not the United States of America alone that knew Saddam Hussein had of course used weapons of mass destruction both against his own population and against Iranians."
If the world did not believe at that time that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, said the U.S. top diplomat, "then I would ask: why was Iraq under some of the most severe sanctions that the international community has ever imposed?"
"The story is there for everyone to see. You can't now transplant yourself into the present and say we should have known what we in fact did not know in 2001, 2002 and 2003" she said.
"The record on weapons of mass destruction was one that appeared to be very clear."
Source: Xinhua
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