A team of UN experts arrived in Baghdad Saturday to assess whether Iraq is ready to elect its own post-occupation government, as Germany said it would not stand in the way of a greater NATO involvement in the war-ravaged country.
Across the border in the northern Kuwaiti desert, Japanese ground troops underwent final desert training before heading to Iraq.
German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said his country, a vocal opponent of the US-led war on Iraq, would not block greater NATO involvement in Iraq, which Washington is seeking in a bid to ease the burden on the mainly US forces.
"The federal republic will not stand in the way of a consensus even if it will not supply German troops to Iraq," Fischer said in Munich at an annual international conference on security.
He defended Berlin's decision not to go to war in Iraq, saying: "It was a political decision not to join the coalition because we were not and we are still not convinced of the validity of the reasons for war."
In New York, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said, "I am very pleased to announce that my fact-finding team has now arrived in Baghdad and is about to begin intensive consultations with Iraqi leaders and the CPA [Coalition Provisional Authority]."
The 12-member team -- the first full-fledged UN mission in Iraq since expatriate staff left after the world body's offices were bombed last August -- will stay in Iraq for up to 10 days, sources close to the UN said.
The experts are tasked with studying the feasibility of organizing direct elections before June 30, in lieu of handing self-rule to a transitional assembly selected by provincial caucuses as envisioned by the US-led coalition.
"The UN team will endeavor to meet with representatives of all constituencies and listen to all Iraqi views and perspectives, without excluding any.
"I hope the work of this team will help resolve the impasse over the transitional political process leading to the establishment of a provisional government for Iraq," Annan said.
But the team, protected by a tight security detail, is not expected to move around Iraq unless absolutely necessary. The coalition remained mum about their visit, and refused to discuss security arrangements.
The Shiite Muslim religious hierarchy headed by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has led a campaign against the coalition's scheduled timetable and procedure for the restoration of sovereignty to the Iraqi people.
Annan ordered the mission marking the world body's return to Iraq as it prepares for self-rule after Sistani made clear he would accept a compromise only if it was endorsed by the world body.
Sistani issued a statement "categorically denying" there had been any plot to kill him, as announced by secular Shiite politician Muwaffaq al-Rubaie, and blasted such reports for "spreading insecurity" before the UN team's arrival.
Although US Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday that the US still intended to hand over power in Iraq at the end of June, he left open the possibility of a postponement depending on UN advice.
"Of course, we would take whatever they [the UN experts] say into account as we move forward, but for now we're sticking with the plan and the [Iraqi interim] Governing Council is sticking with the plan," he said.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, meanwhile, delivered an emotional defense of the US-led war on Iraq as necessary to free a brutalized people from a tyrant who passed up a final opportunity to disarm under the terms of UN Security Council resolutions.
He acknowledged the war to topple Saddam Hussein had taken a toll on the US image in the world given the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but placed the blame on "shocking, absolutely shocking" media coverage.
"I know in my heart and my brain that America ain't what's wrong in the world," Rumsfeld said.
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