THE HAGUE, 06/02/03 - Caretaker Foreign Minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer is visiting his US counterpart Colin Powell tomorrow. He has been invited in his capacity as chairman of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), but the Iraq question is expected to be high on the agenda.

The Dutch government's caretaker status makes the Netherlands cautious in taking an explicit position on a possible war against Iraq. A delicate point is that Labour (PvdA) must be able to live with the position of a government of which it is not currently part, but may be in a few months.

The caretaker cabinet of the Christian democrats (CDA), conservatives (VVD) and Pim Fortuyn List (LPF) is sticking for now to the position that the UN path must be followed for as long as possible, and military pressure on Saddam Hussein kept up. De Hoop Scheffer recently called military force "really the ultimate means that the world community or a country can and may employ to combat great evil. "

The Lower House is split over a military campaign against Iraq. The coalition parties plus the two small orthodox Christian parties ChristenUnie and SGP are in favor of increasing military pressure on Saddam and do not rule out a war. Nor do the PvdA and center-left D66, but they consider the military planning with which the Netherlands, too, is already involved to be premature. The Socialist Party (SP) and leftwing Greens (GroenLinks) are against war in any case.

The entire parliament wants UN inspectors to be given more time, but opinions differ on how much. The cabinet speaks of "not months, but weeks," GroenLinks of "As much as necessary" and the LPF of "As little as possible", with other parties somewhere in between.

A new UN Security Council resolution is rated very desirable, but not necessary per se, say the cabinet and governing parties plus ChristenUnie and SGP. They consider intervention already legitimised in Resolution 1441, which states that Iraq must face "serious consequences" in the case of further "Material breach" of agreements.

The PvdA however believes that the UN Security Council must judge the question of whether there has been material breach. It considers that the US and UK cannot intervene without the support of other countries, and places great importance on France's position. But the PvdA is against a country like China, also a permanent member of the Security Council, being able to veto military action on its own.

If it comes to an attack on Iraq, a parliamentary majority is inclined towards supporting Dutch participation. A majority has no problem with opening up Dutch airspace, and sending Patriot anti-missile systems to Israel or Turkey is also considered seriously. But the parties do not yet want to give an opinion on sending frigates or F-16s. Only the LPF has declared its support for this.