Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze warned Tuesday of an outbreak of war in the Middle East at “any moment.”
In an address to the U.N. General Assembly, Shevardnadze continued to advocate a diplomatic solution to the Persian Gulf crisis. But he appeared to indicate that if diplomatic negotiations failed, force would be justified.
Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has committed “an act of terrorism” against the new world order, Shevardnadze said. He called the Aug. 2 invasion of Kuwait “an affront to mankind.”
The Soviet official made his hard-hitting speech, the toughest yet by a Soviet official since the Iraqi invasion, only hours before the U.N. Security Council voted 14-1 to impose an air blockade of Iraq, prohibiting flights in or out of the country.
Shevardnadze presided over the meeting, which was attended by the foreign ministers of the Security Council members. Only Cuba voted against the new sanctions.
Israeli officials could not help but be pleased both with the Soviet leader’s condemnation of Iraq and the fact that he did not focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in his speech.
One of Israeli Foreign Minister David Levy’s top diplomatic priorities during meetings with world leaders at this year’s General Assembly has been to persuade them not to link resolution of the Persian Gulf crisis with a settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
He discussed this concern in meetings Monday with the foreign ministers of West Germany and Japan, as well as U.N. Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar.
According to the Israelis, Perez de Cuellar indicated that the peace process could be tackled only after the Persian Gulf crisis is resolved.
NOTABLE SHIFT IN SOVIET POSITION
In his speech Tuesday, Shevardnadze all but glossed over the conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbors, and when it was briefly mentioned, he said the Palestinian question could be addressed only after the Persian Gulf crisis is resolved.
The Soviet Union hopes “that at this time of grave trial, the Arab states will live up to the expectations of mankind and help find a way out of the Persian Gulf crisis,” he said. “This would make it possible to deal with other hotbeds of conflict in the Middle East and to find an equitable solution to the Palestinian problem.”
That marked a notable shift from the Soviet Union’s suggestion several weeks ago that an international conference be convened to settle both problems.
But while there was no formal linkage between the two conflicts in Shevardnadze’s speech, two other peace plans proposed this week have formally tied the Arab-Israeli conflict to resolution of the Persian Gulf crisis.
French President Francois Mitterrand, in a speech Monday to the General Assembly, proposed a four-stage solution to the Kuwait situation and various other Middle East conflicts.
Among the problems tackled in the third stage, he said, would be “the Palestinians, who are in the throes of despair, tempted by dangerous courses of action, in order to satisfy their legitimate aspiration to the possession of a land which they could call their homeland.”
The French proposal garnered an enthusiastic response from Iraq, but the United States was not ready to endorse it.
In Washington, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said the plan was “something we’d have to talk to President Mitterrand about and examine in more detail.”
ITALIAN PLAN PROPOSED
While Mitterrand spoke at the United Nations podium, another comprehensive solution to Middle East strife was being developed across the Atlantic.
In Rome, Italian Foreign Minister Gianni de Michelis, in conjunction with Spain, proposed a Helsinki-type international conference on security and cooperation for the countries of the Mediterranean and Middle East.
Modeled on the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, which first convened in the Finnish capital, it would be open to all Mediterranean and Middle Eastern countries, plus the Palestinians.
Italian officials are said to have been working on a model for such a conference for months. They have won Soviet support for their idea, but the United States has remained skeptical.
De Michelis issued the call from Palma de Mallorca, Spain, where he was attending a CSCE meeting on environmental issues.
The Italian foreign minister, who currently chairs the European Community’s Council of Ministers, reportedly hopes his idea can take concrete form by 1993.
(JTA correspondent Ruth E. Gruber in Rome contributed to this report.)
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