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Iraq can rejoin the world community: Chirac

CAIRO: French President Jacques Chirac said on Monday it was time for Iraq to rejoin the world community by adhering to UN resolutions to win the lifting of international sanctions.

"Five years (after the Gulf War), Iraq can restore the place coming to it in the international community," Chirac told some 2,000 invitees at an address at Cairo University. "There is only one way to acheive that and Iraqi authorities must understand that: the route of the Security Council resolutions which fix the framework for international legality," Chirac said.

"These resolutions and only these resolutions must be put into action by Iraq, but also by the Security Council," he said.

"I say it clearly: If Iraq implements all these resolutions the sanctions must be lifted. The world cannot rest indifferent before the worsening humanitarian situation in the country."

"The reinstitution of Iraq should be accompanied by the restoration of trust between Baghdad and its neighbors in the Gulf Cooperation Council, with whom France has developed very close relations," Chirac said.

France took part in the coalition which drove out the Iraqi occupation from Kuwait in February 1991.

The UN slapped crippling economic sanctions on Iraq after its August 1990 invasion of Kuwait, and Baghdad has only fulfilled a portion of the conditions for lifting them, which include an extensive disarmament program.

Chirac gave the speech as he wound up a Middle East trip which also took him to Lebanon.-APP