HIGHLIGHTS: Villepin Says American Draft Contains Contradictory Elements, There is Therefore Work to Do||Russia & France Circulate Counter Draft Resolutions to the American Text||France Proposes Council Session at Ministerial Level|| STORY: France on Sunday resisted U.S. pressure for action on Iraq, saying Washington's proposed U.N. resolution needed changes to win wide international backing.

Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin said there were contradictory elements in the U.S. draft resolution submitted to the 15-member U.N. Security Council last week.

"It includes contradictory elements. There is therefore work to do," Villepin said in an advance copy of an interview to run in Monday's edition of Le Figaro newspaper.

Villepin said it was in the interests of the United States to agree a U.N. resolution that could enjoy broad international support.

Envoys at the United Nations wrangled on Friday over the U.S. draft resolution, and France and Russia distributed rival drafts, trying to pressure Washington into making changes to its text.

France opposes language in the U.S. draft that it says could be used to justify military action before U.N. arms inspectors report on any Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

France wants the Security Council to pass a first resolution on the return of U.N. weapons inspectors to Iraq and then -- if Iraq does not cooperate -- a second resolution to decide on an appropriate response.

Villepin said France had backing for its two-stage approach, but added: "We can't have, at the same time, a two-stage approach and a blank check which could at any time justify unilateral action."

He had proposed a ministerial-level meeting of the Security Council to several of his opposite numbers, including U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, and they had welcomed the idea, he said.

PHOTO CAPTION

French United Nations (news - web sites) Ambassador Jean-David Levitte enters Secretary General Kofi Annan's office, Friday, Oct. 25, 2002 at the United Nations. Levitte was visiting Annan with former Prime Minister and President of the Commission for Foreign Affairs of France, Edouard Balladur. In a surprise move, Russia and France began circulating proposals to significantly water-down a U.S. draft resolution on Iraq, removing language some say could authorize military force against Baghdad and limiting inspections on presidential sites, diplomats told The Associated Press on Friday. (AP Photo/Suzanne Plunket