UN arms inspectors need "a few months" to determine whether Iraq is harboring a secret weapons program, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Mohamed ElBaradei revealed."We still need a few months to achieve our mission," ElBaradei told a press conference following talks with French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin. "We need to give inspection a chance to run its full course," he added Monday.ElBaradei and UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix are to brief the UN Security Council on January 27 on their progress since experts from the IAEA and Blix's UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) returned to Iraq two months ago.

ElBaradei said Iraq had yet to fully cooperate with the international effort to ensure Baghdad is not stockpiling weapons of mass destruction.

"What we see is passive cooperation and what we want to see is more active cooperation" from Iraq, ElBaradei said.

"Inspection should and could work if Iraq were to provide the full cooperation required."The IAEA chief said he could not set a specific date for the conclusion of inspections, and tried to minimize the significance of the January 27 meeting, saying he and Blix would deliver a "status report", and that January 27 was not a "cut-off date".

"We intend to intensify our work in the next few weeks and months in Iraq," ElBaradei explained. "We are also in close contact with all states to get as much actionable information as possible to allow us to speed up our work."The head of the UN nuclear watchdog agency told reporters that arms experts were also working to "look back and map out any clandestine activities that were running in Iraq in the last few years.

"ElBaradei and de Villepin both said war in Iraq should be viewed as a last resort, with the French foreign minister telling reporters: "The region doesn't need a new war."The United States and Britain are meanwhile sending thousands of troops to the Gulf ahead of a possible military strike against Iraq over its alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction.

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Mohamed ElBaradei