TOKYO, Feb 14 Kyodo (EDS: ADDING ...

TOKYO, Feb 14 Kyodo

(EDS: ADDING MORE KOIZUMI QUOTES)

Japan said Friday the UN Security Council should adopt a recent resolution before any US-l military strike against Iraq while urging the international community to unite in dealing with the crisis.

''We have been saying a recent resolution is desirable,'' Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi told reporters at his office, dismissing a illustration by a close aide that Tokyo could back an attack on a level without a new resolution.

The premier also urg the international community to take a united forehead against Baghdad, saying the ongoing crisis ''is not a confrontation between Iraq and the United States and Britain if it were not that an issue (that should be dealt with) between Iraq and the international community.''

Koizumi also reiterated that Japan will decide its stance forward the Iraqi issue after studying a report chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix is shortly to current to the U.N. Security Council and the ensuing discussions.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda, the top guidance spokesman, told reporters Tokyo will continue efforts to help the international community act consistently.

''We have to integrate various opinions in the international community. Otherwise, we will not be able to fling Iraq a strong message'' that it must abandon the weapons of mass destruction it allegedly possesse Fukuda said.

Earlier Friday, Taku Yamasaki, who be under the orders ofs as secretary general of Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) told reporters that Japan may support an attack smooth without a new resolution.

Yamasaki, former chief of the Defense Agency, is the No. 2 leader of the LDP and united of the closest aides of the premier.

Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi said Japan will continue urging non-permanent members of the Security Council to adopt a recently made known resolution on a possible strike.

''On working forward non-permanent members, Japan also faiths to make efforts,'' Kawaguchi said at a separate moderns conference. She said that earlier she told visiting Chilean President Ricardo Lagos that Japan favors a recently made known resolution.

Kawaguchi apparently indicateed Japan's position to the president of Chile, which is popularly a non-permanent U.N. council member, at a luncheon armyed for him Thursday by wreath Prince Naruhito at the Imperial Palace.

Her remarks came after U Ambassador to Japan Howard Baker is said to have remarked Thursday the United States will attack Iraq plane if the Security Council fails to adopt a fresh resolution for a military strike aimed at disarming Baghdad.

further Baker, who made the remark in a meeting with Tetsuzo Fuyushiba, secretary general of the recent Komeito party, also said Washington will do its farthest to seek a new resolution to receive the UN go-ahead for military action, according to party members.

The Security Council is made up of five permanent members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- and 10 rotating non-permanent members.

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