A convoy of 11 vehicles carrying about 90 UN personnel and their luggage left the UN special commission's headquarters in Baghdad, apparently heading for the airport.

The commission said it would hold a news conference later today. The commission withdrew 15 inspectors from Iraq on Saturday, saying they had been idle since the government's decision to refuse to allow them to conduct their work.

Iraq has said it would not cooperate with UN weapons inspectors until the UN Security Council begins moving to lift the embargo imposed after Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990.

The Security Council has said the embargo won't be lifted until UN inspectors certify that Iraq has eliminated itsweapons of mass destruction, as required by UN resolutions passed after the 1991 Gulf War. Iraq is obligated to eliminate its nuclear, biological and chemical weapons programmes as well as long-range missiles.

Yesterday, Iraq's foreign minister, Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, chose an Arab television station -- Qatar's Al-Jazeera -- for his first interview on the dispute. The latest crisis began on October 31 when Iraq halted all cooperation with UN weapons inspectors.

Al-Sahhaf warned that ``any use of military force against Iraq would lead to destabilising the region.''

Hours later in Washington, US President Bill Clinton met senior Pentagon officials to explore options for a possible military attack on Iraq. Defence Secretary William Cohen stepped up the movement of US ships into the region.

"The military option is still on the table,'' Cohen said. Nizar Hamdoon, Iraq's ambassador to the United Nations, said yesterday that ``we have to prepare ourselves'' for a strike, that ``this does not mean that wedon't encourage diplomacy.''

He said Iraq has kept channels open through UN secretary-general Kofi Annan's special representative in Baghdad, Prakash Shah, but that ``nothing really has moved today.''

``There are intensive contacts between the different capitals with Baghdad, and hopefully this could produce some initiatives that could help us in finding a common ground,'' Hamdoon said later in an interview on WNET television.

UN chief weapons inspector Richard Butler, interviewed on the same programme, urged Iraq to face up to the fact that disarmament is connected to the sanctions.

"The key is in its hands and it's called full disclosure to us,'' he said. In mobilising support for Iraq, the country's trade minister, Mohammed Mehdi Saleh, said yesterday that America ``will lose from any strike that takes place, and Iraq will gain.''

The comments reflected Iraq's thinking that sympathy for the Iraqis especially on the Arab streets ``would leave the United States isolated in its campaign againstthe Baghdad regime.''

The tactic of appealing to the Arabs is one indication of how differently the current dispute is unfolding compared to one that ended earlier this year.

When Iraq refused UN inspectors access to President Saddam Hussein's palaces, Russia, France and Turkey rushed envoys to Iraq to try to head off a military strike by the United States.

The dispute was resolved on February 23 when Annan traveled to Baghdad and reached a last-minute agreement with Saddam to open the palace compounds.

This time, Iraq's defiance is not over a technical issue -- such as whether palaces were subject to inspection -- but over the premise of whether there should be an inspection programme.

Iraq has said it will not resume cooperation with the UN special commission until the Security Council begins to move toward ending the sanctions.

Iraq's October 31 decision exempted nuclear experts, and teams from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have gone into the field almost everyday. On Tuesday,five teams visited five sites -- the highest number this month.