By Merle D. Kellerhals, Jr.
Washington File staff writer

Washington -- Secretary of State Colin Powell says he will tell the U.N. Security Council March 7 that now is the time to deal with the threat posed by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's failure to disarm his country of chemical and biological weapons, and outlawed long-range ballistic missiles.

"Are we going to allow an individual such as Saddam Hussein to continue to develop weapons of mass destruction, or deceive us into thinking that he isn't, when we know that he is, because it's too hard to face the consequences of dealing with the truth," Powell said March 6 during testimony delivered to the Senate Appropriations Committee. "We must go after these countries, these rogue nations that proliferate, led by leaders who would strike us and who have shown in the past they will strike their own neighbors, strike their own people, do anything to stay in power and pursue their own agenda.

"This is the time to deal with this kind of threat, not after we have seen thousands of people die as a result of the use of some of these horrible weapons," he said.

Powell, who appeared before the Appropriations Committee to request funding for the Department of State's fiscal year 2004 budget, said that is the message he is taking to the U.N. Security Council.

"The moment we find ourselves in is a critical moment. We are being tested, the Security Council of the United Nations and the international community are being tested," Powell said.

The secretary planned to leave Washington March 6 for meetings in New York with several foreign ministers and ambassadors before the Security Council convenes March 7 to hear a crucial report from chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix of the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and Mohammed ElBaradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), who will discuss the degree of Iraq's cooperation in the search for outlawed chemical and biological weapons, and its destruction of forbidden long-range al-Samoud 2 missiles.

It will be Powell's fourth trip to the U.N. in the past two months, and he will address the Council following Blix's report.

"We cannot allow ourselves to be deterred by false claims that it's all okay, he is complying, when [Saddam Hussein] is not complying, when he is merely deceiving the international community and trying to keep us from doing what we said we would be prepared to do in November when we [the U.N. Security Council] passed Resolution 1441," Powell said.

Asked about rising tensions with North Korea over that country's nuclear program, Powell told the committee members that U.S. foreign policy continues to be that there should not be any nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula.