Britain calls for deadline to be set for Saddam

The west could set Saddam Hussein a final deadline to admit United Nations weapons inspectors under a plan being considered by the British Government to avert US-led attacks on Iraq.

The plan was revealed by Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, last night as the diplomatic rift between London and Washington over military action deepened.

With Tony Blair back at his desk yesterday after his summer holiday, Downing Street reiterated that Britain's priority was for the Iraqi leader to comply with a UN Security Council demand to allow inspection of his weapons facilities. How other council members would react to the deadline proposal is not known.

The comments reflect British worries over the Bush administration's increasingly hawkish anti-Saddam language. In a call for "pre-emptive action" against Iraq, the Vice-President, Dick Cheney, played down the significance of weapons inspections.

And amid signs of growing international worries over unilateral American action in Iraq, Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, has compared the American policy of trying to remove President Saddam to Winston Churchill standing alone against Hitler.

Mr Straw, who discussed the Iraq crisis with the Prime Minister yesterday, said the Government would consider a call by the Commons foreign affairs committee to propose a deadline for the Iraqi leader to readmit the inspectors who left in 1998.

"Existing UN resolutions require immediate Iraqi compliance, including on weapons inspections," the Foreign Secretary said in a reply to the committee. "The Government will be giving further consideration to this recommendation."

Government sources said a deadline would have to be credible, not allowing President Saddam to delay further. Critics will suspect the differing emphasis between Britain and America, of policy and tone, is designed to help the Government through tricky debates on Iraq at next month's TUC and Labour conferences.

Saudi Arabia, traditionally America's staunchest ally in the Middle East, led a chorus of warnings yesterday against war with Iraq. The Foreign Minister, Prince Saud al-Faysal, said President Saddam's removal was for the people of Iraq and outside intervention would destabilise the region. "Our worry, our great worry, is that if you carry this argument to its extent would be that somebody else has to determine the future of Iraq. This never works," he said in an interview with the BBC.