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Iraq, Kuwait, allies

discuss Gulf War missing

KUWAIT: Kuwaiti and Iraqi experts met in a demilitarised border zone on Tuesday to discuss the fate of people who went missing in Iraq's 1990-91 occupation, a U.N. official said.

The talks, chaired by the International Committee of the Red Cross, began at about 0630 GMT on the Kuwaiti side of the frontier and would probably last until 1100 GMT, a spokesman for the U.N. Iraq-Kuwait Observer Mission said by telephone.

The 32-nation observer force, which patrols a 15 km (nine mile)-wide demilitarised border strip set up after the 1991 Gulf War, is providing accommodation and security for the talks but has no further role in the event, he said.

The meeting is the latest in a series by a technical working group of a Geneva-based commission investigating the Gulf War missing.

Kuwait has said it wants to hear Iraq's answers to files prepared by the Gulf state about the cases of 116 people who went missing during Iraq's 1990-91 occupation.

The 116 are among 600 Kuwaitis and nationals from other countries said by Kuwait to have disappeared during the seven-month occupation and the six-week war that ended it.

Kuwait and the United States say a full accounting for the 600 is one of several conditions Iraq must meet before economic sanctions imposed after its 1990 invasion can be lifted.

Iraq has said it released all those it captured during the occupation, but has promised to investigate the issue further.

Representatives from Kuwait's main Gulf War allies, the United States, Britain, France and Saudi Arabia were also believed to be taking part in the meeting, diplomats said. These nations say several dozen of their citizens are missing.-Reuter