The US and Britain will next week begin a push for a UN security council resolution authorizing war against Iraq after the chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, delivers his report today on the frustrating hunt for weapons of mass destruction.

A UN source said Mr Blix would produce "a mixed bag" at the UN headquarters in New York, giving Iraq plus points for access and for addressing some of the complaints he raised last month, but also stressing that serious problems remain.

The US and Britain will jump on the negatives and begin circulating a draft second resolution next week. They aim to speed up the march to war, with a resolution in place by the end of February.

A UN security council source said yesterday that the resolution could contain a deadline, possibly as short as 48 or 72 hours for full Iraqi compliance. That could mean war by early March. The source said the resolution "would light the fuse".

Mr Blix will tell the security council that he continues to have concern over certain vital areas:

· Overflights by U-2 spyplanes. Although Iraq has agreed to his request at the weekend to allow overflights, it set out in a letter to Mr Blix demands that it be given advance notice of such flights. Mr Blix will reject this.

· Interviews in private with Iraqi scientists. Mr Blix will welcome this concession but complain that there have not been enough interviews and that these have not been open enough. Scientists have been taking tape-recorders into the interviews with them.

· He will confirm the verdict of ballistic specialists that there is a prima facie case of breach against Iraq for testing the Samoud-2 missiles beyond the permitted 150km range. But his view is that firing them an extra 33km is not significant, despite Tony Blair insisting yesterday that it was.

· Iraq has handed over new documents in relation to the banned weapons that it claims it has already destroyed but Mr Blix will say these still fall far short of what is needed.

The security council is badly divided and the US and British governments will face a difficult task in trying to secure a majority for the second reso lution and prevent France, Russia and China exercising their vetoes.

Many of the doves on the security council will argue that Mr Blix's report shows a need for more time for inspections.

Mr Blix will almost certainly be asked to report back to the security council, probably on March 1, but that could turn out to be his last report unless there is a change in attitude by the Iraq government.

Despite repeated pledges from Baghdad to encourage Iraqi scientists and technicians to come forward for unchaperoned interviews with experts, the UN considers none of the encounters so far to have been truly private.

That assessment discredits signs of compromise by Iraq over the interviews, especially when a scientist agreed after weeks of delay to meet the UN without a government chaperone on February 6. It has also caused frustration within the UN, where officials are aware that unless they show progress the inspections could be abandoned, and Iraq could be at war.

"We don't have time to play politics with them. We are already at a very critical juncture," one UN official said. "Unless they fully cooperate with the inspectors in all areas, including private interviews, they might as well be digging their own graves."

Since last Thursday, eight scientists have come forward to meet UN experts at various Baghdad hotels. But five of the chemical and biological experts insisted on taping the encounters, prompting the UN to cancel the interviews. The other three, who were nuclear experts, had come forward at Iraq's suggestion.

UN officials say the Iraqis' insistence on taping the interviews - and keeping a copy of the tapes - has deepened their suspicions that the scientists have been coached before their appearances, and that the recordings might be used as a form of intimidation.

The enduring row over interviews with scientists threatens to eclipse other efforts by Iraq to demonstrate the "change of heart" demanded at the weekend by Mr Blix on his visit to Baghdad.

One such sign of Iraq's greater willingness to cooperate with the UN experts has been scheduled for today. Two hours before Mr Blix appears before the security council, the Iraqi parliament is to meet to discuss legislation banning weapons of mass destruction.

Although Iraq's national assembly amounts to little more than a rubber stamp for the diktats of Saddam Hussein, the session has symbolic value for the UN, which has been demanding the enactment of such a law for more than 10 years.

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2003

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