US 'not aware' of Iraqi invite on pilot

UPI ^ | 3-25-2002 | Pamela Hess

[grimalkin]

WASHINGTON, March 25 (UPI) -- The United States says it has not received any invitation from Iraq to send a team to Baghdad for talks on the fate of an American pilot missing since the Persian Gulf War.

"I don't believe very much that the regime of Saddam Hussein puts out. They're masters at propaganda ... We're not aware of any offer by the Iraqi government," U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told reporters Monday.

Lt. Cmdr. Michael Scott Speicher was lost when his Navy F/A-18 Hornet jet was shot down on Jan. 17, 1991, the first night of the war. Iraq said at the weekend it would welcome an American team to Baghdad, but added it still believed the pilot was dead.

Richard Boucher, the spokesman for the State Department, also said Monday that -- apart from news reports -- he had no information about such an offer.

"We've also sent numerous communications to Iraq for specific information and answers to specific questions regarding the shoot-down of Commander Speicher's aircraft," Boucher told reporters.

"So I would say if Iraq is serious about wanting to address this humanitarian issue, they have only to respond to the specific questions through any one of our formal channels. And we have not gotten this proposal through any one of our formal channels."

A statement issued by the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs in Baghdad on Sunday said, "Iraq is ready to receive any American team, accompanied by U.S. media, in order to discuss and document this issue under the supervision of the International Committee of the Red Cross."

In addition, according to the state-run Iraqi News Agency Monday, the Foreign Ministry's spokesman stipulated the search team must also include Scott Ritter, former leader of the U.N. weapons inspection team in Iraq.

Ritter also headed the first team -- a United Nations effort -- that searched for the plane in 1991. Since leaving Iraq, Ritter has criticized U.S. policy toward the country.

"We have a great deal of interest in anything involving Commander Speicher, from any source," Rumsfeld said. "I have no new information about his status."

However, a spokesman for the Iraqi foreign ministry said Iraq believes the pilot is dead. "We have nothing to add to the findings of a previous U.S. team which visited Iraq ... and concluded that the pilot was dead."

The INA reported that in Dec. 1995, a U.S. team had visited Iraq's western desert where the plane was downed, checked the wreckage, and confirmed his death.

The spokesman said another team searched the area in 1993, using helicopters equipped with advanced radars but only found the wreckage.

The Pentagon told United Press International that it had listed the 33-year old pilot as the first casualty of the Gulf War in 1991, and re-affirmed that finding in September 1996, following the 1995 visit to the crash site, which it said was carried out by investigators from the Navy and Army's Central Identification Laboratory.

In Jan. 2001, Secretary of the Navy Richard Danzig changed the U.S. position and re-designated Speicher as missing in action. Subsequently, the State Department sent a formal request to Baghdad asking for more information about him.

U.S. officials told UPI they "consistently sought new information ... to resolve Speicher's fate." They said Danzig's decision followed "additional information and analysis" that emerged since 1995.

But the Iraqi spokesman said there were "contradictions in the American claim," adding that it was willing to welcome a U.S. team to "avoid further confusion."

[PBRSTREETGANG]

...the Foreign Ministry's spokesman stipulated the search team must also include Scott Ritter, former leader of the U.N. weapons inspection team in Iraq.

Ritter should be honored that Iraq asked for him specifically. They must hold him in high regard. Next they'll request that Jesse Jackson be part of the "search team".

[Slam]

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