This is the full text of comments by presidential adviser General Amer al-Saadi at a televised news briefing:

I cannot cover the entire report, which took over 90 minutes to tell the Security Council about. To rebut it point by point would take a lot longer. Therefore, I will do my best in the time possible and we will certainly send a letter, a detailed letter of rebuttal point by point, to the Security Council to be the official response of Iraq to all the allegations that were contained in this report.

No doubt you are aware of the reaction of the world regarding Secretary Powell's allegations regarding Iraq. And it is heartening for us also to see that a lot of people around the world are of the same opinion, that it was intended mainly for the uninformed in order to sway them for the war preparation and also to undermine the UN bodies that were entrusted to implement Security Council resolution 1441.

I will go into the report and I will quote from it and then comment on each quote.

Under the heading of "Quoting Out Of Context" falls the following: I asked for this session today, says Secretary Powell, first to support the core assessment made by Dr Blix and Dr ElBaradei. As Dr Blix reported to this council on 27 January, Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptance, not even today, of the disarmament, which was demanded of it.

Of course, he conveniently omitted the next sentence, which refers to Iraq's delay in enacting national legislation. That, in Dr Blix's opinion, was a measure that Iraq could have done, in his words, to show its political will.

We have had numerous discussions regarding that, and the matter is under consideration and it takes some time. In addition, we have already explained to you, on previous occasions, that this enactment of the law is necessary during the ongoing monitoring phase. That is, it assumes that the disarmament phase is finished and the ongoing monitoring phase, in order to facilitate its function, requires such a law.

And the first to ask for this enactment was the nuclear file, the nuclear domain for which the IAEA was responsible, and it was the first body to ask for that when they really finished their work and they were satisfied with going on with the ongoing monitoring. And we thought at the time that we could only enact the law regarding the nuclear activities.

'Time needed'

When we presented the draft for possible comments, it was returned to us with the comment that the law is required for all activities, not just the nuclear. So, it was back to us and we then proceeded to make another draft, taking examples from other countries, and sent it back for comments late in 1997.

After that, it was not returned to us with comments as required. And the subject was brought up again when we resumed relations with the Security Council and Unmovic. And, as we said, these things take time.

It does not mean that we do not have the political will to do it. It will come. Therefore, this remark by Dr Blix, which was in that context, was taken out of context.

Referring to statements reportedly said by ElBaradei, Colin Powell said, and I quote, "Iraq's declaration on 7 December did not provide any new information relevant to certain questions that have been outstanding since 1998." Unquote.

He conveniently omits the next sentence, which says: Not that these questions have anything to do with disarmament. Something to that effect. I do not remember exactly the words, but the words mean exactly that, not that these questions, which are remaining from 1998, can be considered as questions pertinent to disarmament. So this is another quoting out of context which Secretary Powell was guilty of.

'Concoct and fabricate'

As I said earlier, the purpose of the show that went on inside the Security Council was mainly for home consumption for the uninformed. Here we are, at the world's highest legal authority, the Security Council, presenting the evidence, never mind its veracity, and this is my word, and at the same time, undermining the competence of the IAEA and Unmovic in reaching a satisfactory conclusion.

This is the message that was being told to the world and to the American public.

Regarding the telephone intercepts, I will not grace them with any more comment other than what I said yesterday. They were below the level of a superpower. One can concoct anything and fabricate anything in this regard and they are no evidence at all.

Then he goes on to deal with our declaration on 7 December. I quote: For example, let me focus on the now famous declaration that Iraq submitted to this Council on 7 December. Iraq never had any intention of complying with this Council's mandate.

Instead, Iraq planned to use the declaration to overwhelm us and to overwhelm the inspectors with useless information about Iraq's permitted weapons so that we would not have time to pursue Iraq's prohibited weapons. Unquote.

Secretary Powell conveniently forgets Paragraph Three of Security Council Resolution 1441 which demands from Iraq, among other things, to give a currently accurate, full, and complete declaration regarding its programmes, including any activity which Iraq claims has nothing to do with its past programmes.

It is in the resolution, asking us to tell them exactly what went on in those establishments that previously were engaged in those past programmes and now what are they doing from 1998 onwards.

We did that. We did as required by the resolution. Why now does he say that? It is misleading and conveniently forgetting what the resolution requires from us.

'Useless information'

We did not choose to provide all this information and we had to do them in a hurry, in Arabic, and that, of course, took a long time to translate. We had very little time in order to do that.

As for the past programmes, we were required also to produce our currently accurate, full, and complete declaration about the past programmes, and that is what we did, and to include all the documentary evidence that supported our declaration. And that was the total of over 12,000 pages.

So to claim, as I said, that we intended to overwhelm the inspectors with useless information, then who asked us for the useless information? The resolution itself, which was crafted by the two powers, the United States and the United Kingdom, asked us.

And then he goes on to say: You saw the result. Dr Blix pronounced the 12,200-page declaration rich in volume, but poor in information and practically devoid of new evidence. Could any member of this Council honestly rise in defence of this false declaration?

Now it is a false declaration. On what basis is it false? On the remark purported to have been said by Dr Blix? I do not know where, because he does not have these in quotes, so I could not find it myself.

'Unworthy'

Dr Blix referred to our declaration saying that it did not contain any new explanation or documentary evidence in support of the remaining issues of disarmament from 1998. That is all he said. He did not say that our declaration was false. Nowhere does it mention a word like that. This is an addition purposely put.

These are misquotes and fabrications, unworthy of a superpower. They don't need to do that.

Then it goes on to enumerate a lot of things that are purported to have happened from... [Sentence incomplete] I will quote some of them.

"We know that Saddam's son, Qusay, ordered the removal of all prohibited weapons from Saddam's numerous palace complexes. We know that the Iraqi Government officials, members of the ruling Ba'ath Party, and scientists have hidden prohibited items in their homes. Iraqi files from military and scientific establishments have been placed in cars and are being driven around in the countryside by Iraqi intelligence agents to avoid detection."

All that is fiction, it simply is not true. The palaces - I mentioned yesterday and I repeat it again - were inspected, all of them, previously, in 1998, and recently also. Those that were asked to be inspected were immediately opened for inspection. They took all the measures in order to ensure that nothing, nothing, was stored there or was placed there, as claimed by Secretary Powell.

Then he goes on to say: "Thanks to intelligence, they were provided." The inspectors - of course, the intelligence provided by the United States. The inspectors recently found dramatic confirmation of these reports when they searched the homes of a Iraqi nuclear scientist.

They uncovered roughly 2,000 pages - now they are 2,000; before that they were 3,000 pages of documents, you see them here being brought out - of course showing a slide from the overhead display - brought out of the home and placed in UN hands.

Some of the material is classified and is related to Iraq's nuclear programme.

'Smoking gun'

I explained yesterday the contents of those and I have a rundown.

Happily, Dr Falih insisted on making a copy of all the documents that were seized by the inspectors and he gave us the headings of all the documents that were found. There was nothing of the sort.

The report, to which Secretary Powell alludes in his comments here, is the one that was handed over to the IAEA in 1994, to Mr [Gary Dillon], the chief of the action team on Iraq of the IAEA. This report was acknowledged by the IAEA on 24 September 1994.

So where is the smoking gun, or what you call material breach of highly classified information inside the [word Indistinct]? That report, the author of that report was Dr Falih himself. Why shouldn't he keep a copy?

It is for scientific promotion, because that research was of academic nature. It was not of any practical nature, as is well known.

So, hasty conclusions were drawn. Therefore, the Arabic translators had no time to translate it. He then asks, directing a question to his general, are the inspection teams required to inspect all party centres and [words indistinct] weapons? It is based on hasty and erroneous conclusions. Eventually, it is based on lies.

Then he builds his case [words indistinct] our sources, without giving any good evidence, thinking that this is enough to convince the world. He continues his allegations. He says our sources tell us that in some cases, [words indistinct] what these parts hide.

It seems that from his statements, his sources do not tell him why. There is one answer [words indistinct] deceiving the inspectors. Secretary Powell was in the US army and he should know that we have our defence secrets. Being a general, he should know this. We have military secrets relating to defending our country.

[words indistinct] We know from our sources that [words indistinct] Brigade was distributed in [words indistinct] to various positions. The brigade was deployed in the western region of Iraq. No convincing evidence is offered.

Rockets

The next statement, [words indistinct] most of [words indistinct] were hidden and were placed for one to three weeks in one place so as not to declare it. [words indistinct] commander of the missile forces when he was [words indistinct] since 1991.

There were great efforts [words indistinct]. This is an intentional distortion of the facts.

We also have satellite photos indicating that facilities to manufacture weapons of mass destruction were moved [words indistinct] and why they did not present them to Mr Hans Blix.

These were lies [words indistinct] through the overhead projector. This is one picture, I will read the heading. This is one of the weapons sites taken on 5 December 2002. It shows a military site in the al-Taji area.

I remember these [words indistinct] are manufactured according to British style. They were manufactured long ago and they lack [words indistinct]. He claims that this shack is a house of [word indistinct], that these shacks are sanitised and all materials removed from them before the inspectors visit them, as though chemical weapons can easily be cleaned without leaving traces in the area.

The other photo is for the al-Musayyab Rocket Test Range, as alleged by Colin Powell. And there are, of course, arrows that show the rocket canisters and the launching pad.

He claims that this testing range is where rockets are finally assembled, which is a banned activity. Before that, he showed how aerial photography can be interpreted. He gave us a lecture about an effort that requires days and weeks to interpret and analyse these photos.

And all this expertise failed to inform Mr Powell about the type of rocket and about the damage that it can cause. These photos are true. But, they are photos of rockets with a 70-km range, which we call Al-Ra'd [thunder]; they are also known as [words indistinct] the Al-Ra'd rockets require [words indistinct] they are disassembled and [words indistinct] this is an ongoing process [words indistinct] inspectors visited this site.

Hence, how can one say that this installation is housing some banned rockets? Iraq is currently working at this site at present. It is of a different category.

And, of course, he frightens everybody by saying that there is a 40 metre-long launching pad. This isn't true. He forgot to mention that inspectors visited this site, and it is for testing a missile engine, and [words indistinct] of the test that had taken place regarding this [words indistinct] and that this is under construction with the [words indistinct] to construct a roof over it in order to prevent photography from the air to show what is going on.

It is true there is a roof [words indistinct] placed on it, but it is not for that purpose. It is against the elements, against the sun, and against rain, and it is open from the sides so that they can work. But as the inspectors can verify, this was not as General Powell claims.

Scientists' interviews

And then he goes on to mention orders attributed to our president regarding scientists, interviews, and all kinds of things, all kinds of allegations, which are all fiction. They are absolutely nothing to [words indistinct]. And he again mentioned sources as if it is enough to say our sources say.

There must be some facts because fiction on its own can be so terrible without injecting facts here and there.

Iraq did not meet its obligations under 1441 to provide a comprehensive list of scientists associated with its weapons of mass destruction programmes. Iraq's list was out of date and contained only about 500 names, despite the fact that Unscom had earlier put together a list of about 3,500 names. This, of course, was from Blix's report.

But we have mentioned that Blix and [words indistinct] for the quoting of the past programme, and the past programme, in a pyramid structure, beginning with the head of each unit or outfit with the personnel involved, directly involved down to the level of technician. And this is what we did for each activity.

Now what Unscom refers to in their compilation of names was built up over the years. They had conducted interviews and those interviews took them to minute details of meeting gardeners, guards, soldiers, drivers, truck drivers, and all kinds of people, even citizens, and all these, of course, [words indistinct], but they are not in the core team of the past programmes. They had, in one way or another, been associated.

And we said that we will supply any names needed, and we will happily supply any more information needed regarding the names. We have no problem with that. And we proceeded to give further names, but the request was in accordance with advice from IAEA and Unmovic.

It is not something that we just... [sentence incomplete as heard] because we have thousands of people who are on the payroll of those establishments. Do they need all of them? They have some of them.

They have, in fact, the payroll of the nuclear programme, more than 8,000 people. So why do they need names from us?

Negative message

And then he concludes after all these allegations: These are not assertions, ladies and gentleman, these are not assertions, and these are facts corroborated by many sources, again sources. Some of them are sources of the intelligence services of other countries.

Is that enough to justify all the allegations he has made? And fiction goes on and he says it goes on and on. But, by fiction he does not mean what he is saying, but what we are saying. The fiction goes on and on.

And then he concludes: The [word indistinct] is not just one of reluctant co-operation, nor is it merely a lack of co-operation. What we see is a deliberate campaign to prevent any meaningful inspection work. Now this is a negative message to the inspectors...[sentence incomplete as heard]. The inspection regime, the inspectors, and those who believe in their work are given notice by this.

Then he goes on to deal with the past programmes, portraying references to the past programmes as programmes going on - presently going on and activities that are still going on. As for the biological weapons programme, it was the story of a past programme that no longer existed. This is what we said from the beginning, and since the day we declared that, there is no indication whatsoever contrary to what we said.

The thousands of inspections that were undertaken and the interviews that were undertaken and the tests [sentence incomplete as heard]. And on the contrary, many tests and reports support our declaration. And this matter was subject of the Amorim report, and it was supposed to have been dealt with when we resumed our relationship with the Security Council through a subsidiary organ, Unmovic.

Unfortunately, we asked early in 2002 to engage in a technical discussion regarding this, to go over the evidence that we have submitted and augmented with scientific proposals on how to go about it.

But, Dr Blix declined to engage us in any such meaningful discussion. And now he is asking us in this short time to come up with the answers. [He says] There is no time and the world is impatient with Iraq.

And he repeats many of the old allegations, about the 8,500 litres of anthrax and how they could kill half the world, etc, forgetting that we never managed to dry it and it was in liquid form, which even if it existed today it would be harmless.

Defectors

Then he shows again on the overhead projector the mobile production facility. Now it turns out to be not just a laboratory - a couple of mobile things - but really quite big stuff, which some of it is shown to be on railway tracks and some of it on huge trucks.

And the burden of proof for them is on us as he says. We should prove that we don't have this. How can we prove that? Well, we don't have it. And the sources are defectors, forgetting that even when the information was given to the IAEA and Unmovic, they were found completely baseless and both gentlemen complained that defectors are unreliable and they never gave anything that could be taken as correct.

Nevertheless, he bases serious allegations on stories by defectors. And he mentions that there are 18 such mobile trucks, but perhaps 18 that we know of. Just imagine trying to find 18 trucks among the thousands and thousands of trucks that travel the road of Iraq every single day.

Then he moves on to the chemical file and scares the whole world about VX again, the well-known story of VX, which if he reads carefully, he will find that the quantity in dispute is 1.5 tons. It was what Iraq declared was produced in 1990 - in April 1990 - that deteriorated very rapidly and was spoiled.

There was an inventory of the production of the establishment, which does not show VX because it never went as far as going to the stores. And this inventory is a genuine document, which had been authenticated by Unscom.

And he uses the doubt which Dr Blix had cast on the fate of this because there is no document that says that this quantity was destroyed. Only the place of destruction was indicated by us and it was found true that the [words indistinct] products in that place, but the quantity was not possible to determine.

He takes this as proof that Iraq retains this quantity, when in fact Dr Blix had indicated that they have information or indications that contradict Iraq's declaration. We are not aware of this and it is a subject of transparency.

'No iceberg'

He can tell us what kind of indications they have. Maybe they are misinterpreted, maybe they are misunderstood. We can find the way to resolve this question. But to build a case on just this is not enough. Unscom of course tried through manipulation of samples to prove that Iraq had VX and had 'weaponised' it, and tests at international laboratories in Switzerland and France proved the incorrectness of that test that was performed at the American army laboratory.

Not that we fault the American army analysis. It was correct and meticulous, but we say with justification that it was manipulated by Unscom through samples of VX in the laboratory here in [word indistinct] in Baghdad, which was destroyed by people sent by [former chief inspector] Butler because they claimed that there were dangerous materials there, which put the people at Al-Qanah Hotel at risk and they must be gotten rid off. And by chance, we found that amongst these were vials of VX samples.

What were they doing there? We know now, and also Unscom knows. That was the story of the VX.

And then he refers to the 122-millimetre chemical warheads that the UN inspectors found recently. This discovery could very well be, as has been noted, the tip of the submerged iceberg.

Well, we searched up and down Iraq, everywhere practically and we found some more and we reported them. And our search then did not produce any further material like that. The report will be handed over to Dr Blix when he comes next Saturday regarding our effort. So it is not the tip of the iceberg. There is no iceberg.

I will not go any further. There are some other allegations regarding human rights and relations with al-Qaeda. I will ask my colleague Dr Sa'id al-Musawi to deal with those. Thank you very much.