UN announces progress in issue of Gulf war missing

The UN coordinator for missing and properties Yuli Forontsov announced on Saturday a breakthrough in the negotiations between Iraq and Kuwait concerning the issue of the missing.

Forontsov statement came after his meeting with the Iraqi foreign minister Naji Sabri in Baghdad which the UN envoy visits for the first time since his appointment in this position in February 2000.

The UN official said that the important thing is to proceed with this progress together with the need not to relate it to any political issue. He explained what is meant by the missing is those who are missed from both the Iraqi and the Kuwaiti sides.

The UN official noted that a second Iraqi- Kuwaiti meeting will be held in Amman on January 26th following the first meeting which was held on January 8th in Amman following 4 years of the Iraqi boycott.

In another development, the UN representative said he had discussed with the Iraqi minister the fate of a US pilot missing since the fall of the American plane in Iraq in 1991, noting that the question of the American pilot can be listed in the context of the negotiations on the missing.

Kuwait stresses that some 605 persons, mostly Kuwaitis are still missing since the invasion of the Iraqi forces of Kuwait in August 1990, while the Iraqi authorities also stress that there are 1,000 Iraqi missing in Kuwait.