U.S. says Russia veto on Iraq won't hinder ties

U.S. officials softened their warning about the possibility of long-term damage to relations with Moscow if Russia vetoes a new Security Council resolution on Iraq.

One senior U.S. official said Washington still hoped to persuade Russia not to use its veto but conceded that, "if anything, the indications are more in the other direction".

Russia is eager to avoid a war in Iraq that it regards as being against its interests. President Vladimir V. Putin sent a top envoy, former Prime Minister Yevgeny M. Primakov, to Baghdad last month to urge Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein to step down and go into exile. Saddam rejected the idea.

"It's my understanding that the Russians have been floating that idea," said the U.S. official, confirming rumors that have circulated for some time. The official added that Moscow regarded the possibility of Saddam going into exile as a chance to end the crisis peacefully. U.S. officials were confident weeks ago that Russia would not block military action against Iraq. But with the threat of a veto now in the air, U.S. officials are pondering how they misread Moscow's mood, and weighing how serious the fallout would be.

"We will certainly try to minimise any damage," said the U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The official added that a Russian veto would not lead to any strategic shift in the relationship, which has been improving.

The official said President Bush's phone call to Putin on Wednesday was "a friendly conversation" and it reflected the leaders' determination to keep the relationship on track.

"The leadership of both sides want to minimise the damage because there are so many things that we want to do together," the official said. "But you can't completely insulate the relationship from an issue of this importance."

"I think at the end of the day the U.S. relationship will remain paramount in Russia's calculation, and certainly in Putin's calculations," the official said.

Putin and French President Jacques Chirac, who is leading the effort to block a Security Council resolution authorising war, spoke by phone Thursday and pledged to make further efforts to find a diplomatic solution to the crisis, Putin's news service said.

Part of the difficulty for Washington has been Putin's relative silence on Iraq. He largely has left public pronouncements to Foreign Ministry officials. When Putin lined up firmly in the antiwar camp last month with the leaders of Germany and France, U.S. officials were taken by surprise.

Washington had calculated that Putin, as a pragmatist, valued Russia's relationship with the United States above all other foreign policy objectives. U.S. officials also thought that Russia's interests in the Iraqi oil business and its desire to see Iraq's $8 billion debt repaid, would be enough to ensure Russian compliance.