Iraq Feels U.N.’s Bite : Baghdad to Ration Gasoline; Bush Vows No Compromise

In a sign that U.N. economic sanctions are beginning to bite, Baghdad Radio said today that Iraq will begin rationing gasoline next week. President Bush reiterated that there will be no compromise in demands that Iraq pull its invading troops out of Kuwait.

Iraqi Oil Minister Issam Abdul-Rahim Chalabi did not say how long the rationing would last but said it would affect private cars, trucks and taxis but not the military, the state-owned radio said.

The country is already rationing food staples such as meat, milk and bread.

Iraqi President Saddam Hussein did not resort to gas rationing even during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War, and the measure appeared to be another indication that economic sanctions imposed after Iraq’s Aug. 2 invasion of Kuwait are working.

Chalabi did not say why rationing was introduced. Analysts speculated that lack of spare parts for the country’s refineries may have necessitated the move.

With the seized Kuwaiti oil fields, Iraq’s share of world reserves is 20% .

Iraq’s Oil Ministry today ordered car owners to go to one of a number of special centers set up by the ministry to obtain fuel-rationing coupons.

Bush, before meeting with visiting Soviet Deputy Foreign Minister Yevgeny M. Primakov, ruled out any compromise in the Persian Gulf crisis.

“I am as determined as I was the day that the first (U.S.) troops left (for Saudi Arabia) that Saddam Hussein’s aggression not be rewarded by some compromise, not be rewarded by our failing to get him totally out of Kuwait,” the President said. “The bottom line is he can’t prevail, so we’re going to stay with this, stay the course.”

Primakov, who was in Baghdad last week and reportedly heard an offer from Hussein of a conditional, partial withdrawal from Kuwait, said he brought Bush “no message from Saddam Hussein because I am not a messenger.”

A new poll today indicated solid European backing of the Western stand against Iraq. About 70% of the respondents in Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Spain support the use of military force to end the 12-week-old occupation.

Germany said today that Baghdad will free eight German hostages, but at the same time about 100 relatives of German hostages remaining in Iraq demonstrated in Bonn to complain that their government was not doing enough to help free the captives.

A German Foreign Ministry spokesman said the eight hostages, who were awaiting visas, were on a list of “urgent cases” of elderly and sick people the government gave to Iraq some time ago.

“It has been announced that a release will take place,” the German government spokesman said. He said Iraq informed the German Embassy in Baghdad of the decision.

Iraq is still holding another 300 Germans, including 76 thought to have been taken to strategic locations in Iraq to serve as human shields against allied attack.

In Cairo, a Saudi airliner was delayed for four hours today after a caller said a bomb was aboard the plane, Egypt’s Middle East News Agency reported. No bomb was found aboard the flight from Cairo to the Red Sea resort of Jidda with 336 passengers aboard, and it was allowed to leave.

In London, former Conservative British Prime Minister Edward Heath left for Baghdad today via the Jordanian capital of Amman on a private visit to seek the release of sick and elderly British hostages, Amman Radio said.

Iraq asked Heath, a persistent critic of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s domestic and foreign policies, to postpone his visit for a week to give Iraqi authorities time to prepare for his visit. Some British lawmakers described the trip as a propaganda coup for Hussein, but Heath insisted it is his “humanitarian duty.”

Also today, Iraq told all foreigners still in Kuwait to register by Nov. 5 and warned that “anyone who does not get a valid residence visa will be fined or jailed,” Baghdad Radio said.

It said Jordanians, Egyptians and Yemenis were excluded from the order.

Iraq warned Kuwaitis earlier that anyone caught harboring a foreigner could face execution.