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Sunday, January 16 11:37 AM SGT

Defiant Iraq prepares victorious Gulf War celebrations BAGHDAD, Jan 16 (AFP) - A defiant Iraq on Sunday prepared "victorious" celebrations to mark the ninth anniversary of the Gulf War as it vowed to continue the fight against its enemies and their plots at the United Nations.

Some 45 days of festivities are to be launched Monday, the anniversary, and "reflect Iraq's determination in the face of the US, British and Zionist aggressors who continue to harm our people," the Ath-Thawra newspaper said.

Rallies are to be held "to denounce the US-British aggression and demand the immediate lifting of the unfair embargo" imposed on Iraq after it invaded Kuwait in August 1990.

Although the Gulf War against Iraq, waged by a US-led international coalition, ended in February 1991, Baghdad maintains it is still fighting the battle against the "savage imperialist aggression".

Iraqis "inflicted a defeat on America during the 'Mother of All Battles'," the Al-Qadisssiya newspaper said Saturday in a reference to the Gulf War that drove occupying Iraqi troops out of Kuwait.

"The battle, which continues, was a victory for the Arab nation and for humanity as a whole in the face of the savage imperialist aggression which aims to control the world and bring its people to its knees," the daily said.

Iraq continues to be regularly bombed by US and British warplanes patrolling no-fly zones over the north and south of the country, in a war of attrition that Baghdad says has cost more than 150 Iraqi lives.

But Iraq maintains the key battle has switched from the field to the United Nations, where Washington has been "hatching new plots which will allow them to achieve their illusions".

The latest target of Iraqi vitriol has been a new UN resolution approved in mid-December covering sanctions and arms inspections in Iraq. Baghdad has attacked the resolution without rejecting it outright.

Foreign Minister Mohammed Said al-Sahhaf last week suggested Baghdad might accept the resolution if parts of it are altered.

The new resolution offers Iraq a temporary lifting of sanctions if it cooperates with a new arms inspection body, UNMOVIC, whose chief was due to be appointed by Sunday.

Differences within the Security Council have continued to hinder the appointment and Baghdad has repeatedly predicted that "this body is still-born and doomed to fail because it will be no better than what preceded it."

The previous arms body, UNSCOM, was dissolved in December. Baghdad regularly accused it of being a vehicle for spies.

In a January speech Iraqi President Saddam Hussein said Baghdad could not rely on the Security Council to lift the embargo, since it was controlled by the "forces of evil", a reference to the United States and Britain.

Iraq has instead launched a diplomatic offensive to win support for its opposition to the resolution, with top-level visits to China and the Gulf state of Qatar.

"The best attitude to adopt is to wait for developments at the United Nations and take adequate measures after that," an Iraqi official told AFP, asking not to be named.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi people mostly continue to live miserably under sanctions, with only minor relief coming from an expanded UN oil-for-food programme, allowing oil sales in return for humanitarian aid.

Baghdad says that some 1.25 million people, mostly infants and the elderly, have died as a direct result of the sanctions first imposed a decade ago.

A team of aid workers led by former US attorney general Ramsey Clark and a delegation of Spanish MPs and trade unionists are due in Baghdad for the anniversary to draw attention to the sanctions' impact.

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-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), January 16, 2000