The foreign minister of Qatar said Monday he disagreed with the U.S. goal of trying to oust Saddam Hussein. "We disagree with the idea of regime change in Iraq," Sheik Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabor Al Thani said in remarks at the close of a three-day conference on U.S. relations with the Islamic world. A change of regime "cannot be done except through the international court of justice or international law or international resolutions," said Sheik Hamad, who insisted he was speaking as an ordinary citizen rather than the foreign minister. "The principle of regime change, we think, is wrong," he said.

U.S. President George W. Bush has insisted Saddam must be ousted for repeatedly flouting United Nations resolutions calling on Iraq to destroy weapons of mass destruction. For weeks, talks on a new, tougher U.N. Security Council resolution governing the mandate of U.N. weapons inspectors have been progressing slowly, with France and Russia insisting the inspectors be allowed to assess whether Saddam still posseses banned weapons programs before using force.

The inspectors left Baghdad in December 1998 ahead of U.S. and British airstrikes punishing Iraq for obstructing their work. Iraq has recently said it will allow them to return.

"If Iraq represents a threat as far as weapons of mass destruction are concerned, then such claims should be backed by overwhelming evidence. That evidence depends on the return of inspectors to Iraq, who can then come back and say whether these weapons do or do not exist," Sheik Hamad said.

"If they do exist, then Iraq must get rid of them," he said.

Sheik Hamad added that the United States wanted help from regional countries because it felt threatened by weapons Iraq may have, but that Washington did not seem to care about threats posed to regional countries by Israel, which is known to possess nuclear weapons.

Addressing the United States, Sheik Hamad said: "If you want Iraq to get rid of its weapons, and if you want cooperation from countries in the region, then there should be cooperation on your part too in order to make another country (Israel) get rid of its weapons of mass destruction." He spoke in Arabic.

He said that Qatar opposed all forms of terrorism, but that it was wrong to lump the Iraqi government together with terrorists.

PHOTO CAPTION

H.E. Qatar's Foreign Minister, SH Hamad Ben Jassim Ben Jabor Al-Thani, seen here in this file photo during a recent visit to Baghdad where he conveyed a verbal message to the Iraqi leader from HH the Emir of Qatar, SH Hamad Ben Khalifa Al-Thani. Speaking as a private citizen H.E. the Foreign Minister told an international function in Doha on Monday said that he opposes U.S. policy of 'Regime Change' in Iraq.