United Nations: UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has said that it is possible to get a compromise resolution on Iraq and suggested that foreign ministers of veto wielding five permanent members of the Security Council meet with him to hammer out differences on the issue.

Annan made the comment in an interview with CNN as the Security Council began discussing the American draft resolution to establish a multinational force under the United States command in Iraq.

"There's going to be some discussions and negotiation, but I think it is possible to get a compromise," he said.

Annan said he asked representatives of the council's five permanent members – the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China – for a meeting with him and "explore a common ground and a way forward. And I hope that meeting would take place in the not-too-distant future."

The Secretary General also said he wants the resolution to provide a "very clear definition for the UN, the role we should undertake" in Iraq.

The previous one establishing a UN role in reconstruction efforts, he said, "was rather ambiguous".

Meanwhile, Annan has appealed to the international community to forge unity after divisions caused by the Iraq war and said nations should agree among themselves on the main threats facing humanity.

The appeal is contained in Annan's latest report – to be released Monday – on achieving the goals set by the United Nations Millennium Summit of 2000.

Annan also said the international community must not flinch from radical reform of the UN itself, as well as other international bodies, if this is necessary to make them more effective, his spokesman, Fred Eckhard, said in a statement on September 6.

The 2000 summit set a series of Millennium Development Goals, aimed at a series of ambitious targets ranging from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS to providing universal primary education, all by 2015.

PTI