By William Drozdiak
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, September 6, 1992; A01
SKHIRAT, Morocco, Sept. 5, 1992 -- King Hassan II of Morocco today issued the strongest public warning by an Arab leader about the hazards of Western policy toward Iraq, saying the U.S.-orchestrated ban on Iraqi flights over the south of the country could lead to its dismemberment.
While deploring President Saddam Hussein's continuing refusal to abide by all U.N. resolutions, the 63-year-old monarch said escalation of Western military pressure against the Iraqi leader is counterproductive and "risks turning this exclusion zone into an explosion zone that in the long run will be harmful to the interests of the West and the Arab world."
The exclusion zone was set up to protect Shiite Muslims in southern Iraq who staged a short-lived rebellion against Saddam at the close of the Persian Gulf War.
The Moroccan monarch's warning gave a prominent voice to private misgivings reportedly shared by several U.S. allies in the Arab world who are concerned about the possible breakup of a major Arab power. Such allied Arab governments, run by Sunni Muslims, also are concerned about the implications in their own countries of encouraging Iraq's Shiite Muslim rebels to defy its Sunni establishment.
[King Hussein of Jordan appears to share some of Hassan's hesitations about the Iraqi flight ban, according to a senior Jordanian source, who said dismemberment of Iraq would be "catastrophic for the region." Story, Page A41]
"If we continue to cut off links between the north and south of Iraq, we will divide not only rich from poor but worsen a religious split between Sunnis and Shiites," Hassan said in an interview at his seacoast palace here, 20 miles south of Rabat. "And later we will find it very difficult to glue that mosaic back together."
Noting that Western policies now offer protection to Kurdish rebels in the north of Iraq as well as to the Shiites, Hassan said the creation of an independent Kurdistan and a Shiite state would threaten neighboring Turkey and Saudi Arabia and lead inexorably to chaos in the region.
The governments of Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf countries are known to hold strong reservations about the possible repercussions of the flight ban, with which the United States seeks to thwart Saddam's air attacks on Shiites and erode his hold on power. But Arab governments have been reluctant to criticize the actions of Western allies who last year drove invading Iraqi forces out of Kuwait.
The king said it was important to distinguish between Saddam and the Iraqi people, who he emphasized "should not have to pay the bill" for his misdeeds. But since the end of the Persian Gulf War, Western policies have only contributed to pressures on the population and raised fears that the country might be torn apart, Hassan said. Those forces, in turn, have helped to entrench Saddam and work against the longer-term objectives of the outside world.
While Iraq's Kurdish and Shiite rebels have said they want to retain a single Iraqi state, the king warned that the country could break apart. "The Shiites in this part of the world are tough and brutal, they have never been in favor of dialogue and cooperation," said Hassan, a Sunnite. "In the north you have most of the oil production, so the rest of the country fears it will become poor [if Kurdistan became independent]. You have to remember that when you consider what can happen if this area detaches itself from Iraq."
Meantime, he said the West's pressure on Saddam has compelled the Iraqi leader to court further military disaster by confronting the West in his play for domestic political support. "We want Saddam to go, but if he does, where could he go? Cuba?," the king asked. "He knows he is condemned to live only in Iraq, because he can't give himself the chance of taking refuge elsewhere."
Discussing the Arab-Israeli issue, Hassan said the current peace process has developed unstoppable momentum. He said he is prepared to host a meeting in Morocco between Syrian President Hafez Assad and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin whenever they are ready.
The Moroccan king, who is known for his pro-Western sympathies, was the first Arab leader to sever ties with Iraq after the invasion of Kuwait and to offer troops to defend Saudi Arabia. He is considered an important interlocutor because of his friendly ties with leaders throughout the Middle East, including Israel.
Hassan met Rabin as early as 1976 and was a key mediator in negotiations that led to the 1979 Camp David agreement between Egypt and Israel. He said today he is more optimistic now about a broader peace accord.
"I am more convinced than ever that momentum in the peace process cannot be stopped because negotiations have passed the point of no return," the king said. "It's like a plane that once it has taken off is compelled to gain altitude. You will soon see that the dynamics of history will accelerate."
The king said he is ready to host meetings between Israeli and Arab leaders at any time. But, he added: "It is not up to me to invite them. If Assad and Rabin decide to grant us the privilege of hosting their meeting in Morocco, it would be a great pleasure to do so.
"I know Rabin has said he is willing to meet Assad wherever and whenever he wants, but it is not up to me to push him into something he may feel not yet ready to do, because perhaps he thinks the time is not yet ripe."
Hassan also spoke of the conflict in the Balkans, calling the suffering of Muslims in Bosnia a "flagrant injustice." He said that the difference in the West's reactions to the crises in Kuwait last year and the Balkans this year is due to economics.
"It's a case of rich and poor," he said. "If there was oil in Yugoslavia, the West would have acted just as fast as in Kuwait. It's sad to say, but true."
With the passing of the Cold War and the East-West ideological struggle, Hassan said the outlines of the emerging global conflict -- pitting the haves of the North against the have-nots of the South -- are already becoming strikingly clear.
"The worldwide battle between rich and poor will not be one involving armies or even politics. It will be a moral one between good and evil," he said. "What kind of reaction can you expect in Somalia, or other places where people are starving to death, when they see people in northern Europe throwing tomatoes in the streets or dumping butter and milk?
"And in this kind of struggle, the poor will always triumph over the rich," he said. "That is because they produce many more children, and because they are like the desert that each year conquers more and more fertile territory. That's how rich countries should be thinking about the poor, in the way you look at a drought that is slowly devastating your farm."