London, Sept 27: Britain and the United States have agreed on a draft text for a new UN Security Council resolution requiring Iraq to disarm, the Foreign Office said on Thursday, saying London was pressing for "tough inspections". "After several days of discussion we have agreed the elements of a draft text with the US and are now in discussion with other UN Security Council partners," a Foreign Office spokesman said.

"As we have already said, there need to be tough inspections," he said. "It would help the inspectors to have the terms laid out by the UN Security Council."

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The spokesman declined to comment when asked if the draft resolution mentioned military force if Iraq failied to comply with weapons inspections.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell earlier told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: "We have come into agreement with the United Kingdom on what the elements of the resolution should look like."

Britain backs the US on the need to threaten Iraq with military action if it fails to comply with UN resolutions to renounce weapons of mass destruction, though it stops short of explicitly calling for President Sadda m Hussein's ouster as a primary goal. Bureau Report