A senior US official said the United States had positive responses from three African members of the Security Council -- Angola, Cameroon and Guinea -- which had previously been uncommitted. "We're assured by what we heard from them," said the official, who asked not to be named.

If confirmed, that would bring support for the war resolution in the 15-member Security Council up to seven, two short of the nine votes needed for passage. A veto from France, Russia or China, all of which are on record as opposing the resolution, would still kill it.

President Bush has vowed to go to war with or without UN backing and there are around 250,000 US and British troops poised to invade Iraq.

However, abandoning attempts to get the approval of the world body would carry a heavy price, especially for British Prime Minister Tony Blair, whose political future could be at stake.

Earlier on Wednesday, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said: "I wouldn't deny that we are making progress but I don't want to mislead you into thinking that we've got it in the bag."

Much of the diplomatic activity on Wednesday focused on the new British proposals, which included requiring Saddam to address his nation on Iraqi television and confess he had in the past tried to hide weapons of mass destruction but had made a strategic decision to give them up.

US and British officials also said they might move their proposed ultimatum to Saddam from March 17, possibly to March 21 or March 24.

Bush 'Went Extra Mile'

With a vote expected by the end of the week, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said: "We are indeed in the final stages of diplomacy and in these final stages the President

(Bush) has gone the extra mile.

"That extra mile will come to an end and the time for diplomacy will come to an end. And the only question that will remain is, has Saddam Hussein disarmed," he said.

Britain's UN ambassador Sir Jeremy Greenstock said he would only formally present the new proposals if they appeared to attract support. "If it attracts attention and interest, we will develop that concept. If it doesn't, we remain exactly where we are now," he said.

British officials said they wanted to present the conditions as a side statement but not an integral part of a fresh resolution.

Apart from the African trio, the other uncommitted Security Council nations were Mexico, Pakistan and Chile. Definitely in favor of the resolution were the United States, Britain, Spain and Bulgaria. Against were Russia, China, France, Germany and Syria.

In another sign of the intense diplomatic pressure Washington was bringing to bear, the US ambassador to Russia, Alexander Vershbow, warned Moscow to think twice and "carefully weigh all the consequences," before using its UN veto.

US officials said there was still a chance Russia and China would abstain, but France was seen as a definite 'no' vote. However, that outcome would allow Washington to argue that it had international legitimacy and that France was the country defying the world community.

List of Demands

Diplomats thought the list of British conditions would be next to impossible for Saddam to accept without fatally weakening the basis of his power.

They included demands that Iraq should allow 30 of its scientists to be interviewed outside the country; surrender stocks of anthrax and other biological and chemical agents or produce documents to prove they were destroyed; destroy banned missiles; account for unmanned aerial vehicles, and promise to hand over all mobile biological weapons laboratories for destruction.

The White House tried to calm strains with its British allies provoked after Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld suggested Washington was ready to go it alone without the support of troops from Britain if necessary.

Britain said it would fight. "If action is necessary, there will be a significant part played by British troops," said a spokesman for Blair, who brushed aside lawmakers' calls for him to save his political career by accepting a noncombat role for British forces.

(China Daily March 13, 2003)