The charges were aired by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's advisers to the The Washington Post, apparently with his consent. The Post reported in a story on Wednesday that Annan had obtained what he regards as "convincing evidence" in this regard.

"The Secretary General has become aware of the fact that UNSCOM directly facilitated the creation of an intelligence collection system for the United States in violation of its mandate," an unnamed Annan adviser was quoted as saying.

The advisers said Annan is convinced that Washington used the UNSCOM operations to penetrate the security apparatus protecting Saddam Hussein including listening to sensitive communications of the Baghdad regime.

"The United Nations cannot be a party to an operation to overthrow one of its memberstates. In the most fundamental way, that is what's wrong with the UNSCOM operation," the unnamed Annan adviser said.

The charges are certain to further exacerbate an already fragile relationship between Annan and the Clinton administration, particularly after The Post quoted the adviser as saying that instead of risking a direct confrontation with Washington, the Secretary General "would like to see the news media report this, and let the chips fall where they may."

Annan's charges are reportedly based on classified US information passed to him through intermediaries. The Secretary General also has accumulated a considerable body of circumstantial evidence on eavesdropping.

Annan's inner circle has two Indians including Prakash Shah, his special envoy for Iraq. The novelist Shashi Tharoor works as his executive assistant.

Clinton administration officials did not directly deny the charges and said "going after UNSCOM is shooting the messenger."

"The fundamental problem here is not UNSCOM, andto fall into the trap of saying that UNSCOM may or may not have done something appropriate or inappropriate is to divert attention from compliance by Saddam Hussein," one official argued.

US officials also maintained that Saddam's personal security apparatus and the apparatus that conceals weapons of mass destruction are one and the same and therefore it is impossible to distinguish them for intelligence purposes.

Annan and Washington have disagreed over Iraq almost from the time he took over. The Secretary General narrowly averted a US-led bombing of Iraq last year by brokering a last minute deal with Baghdad. But this time, much to his dismay, the US ignored him and lit into Baghdad.

Annan has also opposed some of UNSCOM's more intrusive tactics. He is said to favour a new leadership and new mandate for the inspection regime which withdrew from Baghdad before the December bombing.

In particular, he is said to be in favour of the resignation of the UNSCOM's executive chairman, the Australian RichardButler, who is seen in many quarters an American stooge.

Suspicion that Washington was using UNSCOM for spying on Saddam has been around for a while, particularly after reports about the close working ties between the UN body and the US Central Intelligence Agency.

According to one account, in a September 1996 meeting with then CIA Director John Deutch, then UNSCOM Chairman Rolf Ekeus complained that US intelligence agencies had declined to share the full fruits of their joint work with UNSCOM.

While UN officials are upset over some of Washington's unilateral actions, there is also increasing resentment here over the UN role. US politicians, particularly the Conservatives, believe that a country which pays one-fourth of all UN costs is entitled to more clout.

A recent survey revealed of the UN 118 most senior staffers, only 18 were Americans. Two-thirds of 1652 Americans in the 13,000 UN-secretariat staff held low level clerical posts and only about 500 held professional jobs.

India, which paysthree-tenths of one per cent of UN costs, had 341 appointees -- or 2.6 per cent of the total UN jobs.