Annan Warns U.S. Will Face Doubts
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, February 7, 2004; Page A18

UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 6 -- The U.S. failure to uncover weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has heightened international skepticism over the quality of American intelligence and may complicate efforts to use it in the future to build a case for action against outlaw regimes, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said Friday.

"The bar has been raised," Annan said during a break in a U.N. conference on financing the reconstruction of Liberia. "People are going to be very suspicious when one talks to them about intelligence. And they are going to be very suspicious when we try to use intelligence to justify certain actions."

The U.N. chief's statement underscored the potential damage the questionable intelligence the Bush administration used to justify the war in Iraq is having on U.S. credibility at the United Nations.