The United States and its allies vowed to force Iraq to honor U.N. resolutions on Sunday as diplomats from around the world sought to convince Baghdad to readmit arms inspectors to avoid war. U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said he expected quick action from the international community to condemn what he called Iraq's defiance of Security Council resolutions.

The United States would give other countries a few days to consider President Bush's call for action to enforce 16 earlier U.N. resolutions, but hoped to begin crafting fresh ones by the end of this week, Powell said in interviews with U.S. television stations.

He said any resolution should include a tight deadline for Iraq to declare "within weeks" its willingness to comply. "Then a new clock starts as to what happens after that," he added.

Powell said the Security Council would have to decide whether to draft a single resolution that would authorize military action if Iraq failed to cooperate, or whether to await Iraq's response before issuing a second resolution.

"We believe that it might be wise to get it all in the first resolution; but because this is a discussion with our friends, we're not ruling out any option at this point."

Powell declined to give any assurance that Saddam could stay in power if he disarmed. "I am not going to go that far," he said, adding that U.S. policy still aimed at "regime change," meaning the removal of Iraq's leadership.

"We will see what the U.N. effort is able to do. And the president retains all of his options to act in a way that he believes is appropriate to defend U.S. interests and the interests of our friends and allies," Powell said.

SADDAM HAS A CHOICE: DISARM OR RISK BEING OUSTED BY FORCE

His refusal to rule out "regime change" regardless of any change of heart by Saddam was likely to disturb many countries hoping that Washington will not take unilateral action against Iraq outside the U.N. framework of international law.

Even Britain, Washington's staunchest ally, implied that Saddam had a genuine choice and could save his "dreadful, brutal regime" by disarming. "Either he deals with those weapons of mass destruction or his regime will have to end," Foreign Secretary Jack Straw told Sky News television.

So far Iraq has shown little sign of heeding U.S. threats or increasingly urgent diplomatic pleas from other nations.

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer met his Iraqi counterpart Naji Sabri at the United Nations and told him "the best strategy to avert war is to allow weapons inspectors in."

Downer said Sabri had reiterated Iraqi demands for an end to U.N. sanctions and to the "no-fly" zones enforced by the United States and Britain in Iraqi airspace. "I got the distinct impression that Iraq at this stage would not allow unconditional access to the inspectors," Downer told Reuters.

In the latest of many such raids over the past 12 years, U.S. and British warplanes bombed targets in southern Iraq on Sunday.

The U.S. military said the jets had attacked an air defense communications facility. Iraq said "civilian and service installations" had been hit. No casualties were reported.

Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told Sabri on Saturday that Iraq must meet all council resolutions without preconditions. "In the first instance, this concerns the resumption of disarmament monitoring on Iraqi territory," he told Itar-Tass news agency.

Russia, which has recently moved away from its traditional sympathy for Iraq, is among the five permanent members of the 15-nation U.N. Security Council and holds veto power.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, in the clearest hint from a world leader so far of when Iraq might face attack, said after talks with Bush on Saturday that action might occur next January or February if Baghdad barred inspections.

Bush's recourse to the United Nations has won him some international support on Iraq, but the Arab world, Germany and some other nations remain opposed to any military solution.

PHOTO CAPTION

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell speaks during the taping of 'Meet the Press' at NBC's studios in Washington, September 15, 2002. The United States and its allies vowed to force Iraq to honor U.N. resolutions on Sunday as diplomats from around the world sought to convince Baghdad to readmit arms inspectors to avoid war. Powell said he expected quick action from the international community to condemn what he called Iraq's defiance of Security Council resolutions. (Reuters - Handout)