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Dear List, To the “seekers after the truth”: is there any limit to how far they will go in thier lying?? HZ --------------------------------------------------- http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=3558401 Poland Apologizes for French Missiles Report Sat October 4, 2003 05:13 PM ET By Pawel Kozlowski and Marcin Grajewski WARSAW/ROME (Reuters) - Poland apologized to France on Saturday for saying its troops had found advanced French-made missiles in Iraq that had been produced this year. The report sparked criticism from French President Jacques Chirac, who called it wrong and drawn up without proper checks. But neither Polish nor French authorities denied that the Roland-type anti-aircraft weapons were found near the Iraqi town of Hilla in a zone controlled by the Polish-led military force. "I apologized to France for this information, which had been issued without my authorization," said Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski, adding that an investigation had been ordered. He said Polish troops were likely to have interpreted the 2003 inscription on the missiles as the year of their production. "And this could have been, for example, the date up to which they are fit to be used," he said. The Defense Ministry said on Friday that Polish troops in Iraq had discovered four French-made Roland missiles, which are part of short-range air defense systems in many countries including France and Germany. Ministry spokesman Eugeniusz Mleczak told Reuters the missiles were manufactured in 2003, but the French Foreign Ministry promptly denied that, saying production of the most modern Roland 3 rocket ended in 1993. "There could not be any 2003 missiles because those missiles have not been manufactured for 15 years," Chirac told a news conference at a European Union summit in Rome. "I believe the Polish soldiers have created confusion that could have been avoided with thorough verification," he said, adding that he had made the point to Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller "in a friendly but frank and firm way." FRANCE ANGRY The spat briefly sent France's relations with Poland, the biggest of 10 countries set to join the EU in seven months, to fresh lows after Chirac criticized Warsaw for supporting the U.S.-led war on Iraq, some diplomats said. But a senior French diplomatic source told reporters that following the Polish apology "France was satisfied and the issue was clarified." "The issue had weighed to some extent on the summit. But after our clarifications it has been put behind us," said Polish Foreign Minister Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz. Many Polish politicians cannot forgive Chirac, an outspoken opponent of the war, for his remark this year that Poland and other EU newcomers "missed a good opportunity to keep quiet" when they signed a joint open letter in support of Washington. France has been irritated by Poland's refusal to accept a new EU voting system embedded in a draft constitution which EU members and newcomers debated in Rome. The United States gave a Polish-led force control over a zone in south-central Iraq after Poland emerged as one of its strongest allies in the war against Iraq. A French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman told Reuters on Friday that Roland 1 missile systems were sent to Iraq from 1980 to 1981 and Roland 2 systems from 1983 to 1986. The Roland 3 was never exported to Iraq, she said. Under a strict trade embargo imposed by the United Nations, Iraq was barred from buying arms after its invasion of Kuwait in 1990. But Baghdad managed to circumvent the ban in the 1990s through shadowy deals with various arms traders. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Shopping - with improved product search http://shopping.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk