"We have been approached last week," Cassoulides told foreign journalists.
"Provided that certain issues are resolved, like no political asylum and no long stays, then we are going to give a positive answer." Cyprus, the staging post for the UN inspectors seeking Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, would also host UN personnel evacuated in case of a US-led war on Iraq, he added.
Cassoulides said on January 9 the Mediterranean island was willing to welcome the delicate mission on the condition that the scientists and their families did not stay permanently.
"We would look at any request positively, but under certain assurances that certain responsibilities were undertaken," he told AFP.
"There is no question of granting political asylum to anybody, it would be a question of facilitating the work of UNMOVIC (UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission) and the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency)," he said.
Cyprus is viewed as an ideal venue for interviews as it already hosts a UN field base near Larnaca international airport on the southern coast, from where inspectors and equipment are flown to Baghdad.
UN Security Council Resolution 1441 allows for the interviewing of Iraqi scientists outside the country, taking them and their families to locales where they would be free from intimidation by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's regime.
Although the resolution provides for such "safe haven" interviews, it gives no guidelines on the practicalities of such a process, nor does it specify how any request for political asylum by scientists would be handled.
"We are not going to abduct anybody and we're not serving as a defection agency," UNMOVIC chief Hans Blix has said.
Source : Sapa-AFP
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