Saudi Arabia to Provide Half of Jordan’s Oil : Energy: Accepting it may force King Hussein to dampen his criticism of the Saudis for inviting U.S. troops to confront Iraq.

Saudi Arabia has agreed to provide Jordan with half its daily oil needs, Jordanian officials said Wednesday, in a move that observers said is aimed at weaning Jordan from its reluctance to apply a U.N. trade embargo against Iraq.

The provision of oil would help cushion some of the cost for Jordan of enforcing an embargo against Iraq, which invaded Kuwait three weeks ago. For the past decade, Jordan has received 90% of its crude from Iraq.

The estimated amount to be provided by Saudi Arabia--33,000 barrels a day--would cover only about 50% of Jordan’s needs, and it is not clear where the rest will come from.

The decision to accept oil from Saudi Arabia may force King Hussein to dampen his criticism of Saudi Arabia for inviting American troops to confront Iraq.

King Hussein, at a news conference, gave no details on the deal with Saudi Arabia, saying, “Certainly, I think that Jordan will try to seek to get some oil to meet its needs--how and from where, I don’t know.” But at the same time he said Jordan would continue to receive oil from Iraq.

Also at the news conference, the Jordanian monarch announced that he will restart his own brand of shuttle diplomacy, embarking on an international tour to try to get diplomatic solutions to the Persian Gulf crisis off the ground. One visit will be to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in Baghdad, he said.

But Western sources said they view the efforts of King Hussein, who is no relation to Saddam Hussein, as a smoke screen for his pro-Iraqi political stand. Jordan insists that to condemn the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait would end its self-designated role as diplomatic middleman.

“Let’s face it, the United States does not need the king to talk with Saddam,” one Western diplomat said. “But it is convenient for King Hussein to maintain the fiction.”

In Iraq, Baghdad television announced that President Hussein will respond today to an impassioned plea for peace from Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Later, the state-run news agency declared of Mubarak: “Whatever his good intentions, he is not offering fundamental solutions.”

The Iraqi leader insists that Kuwait is rightfully Iraqi and that its status is a matter for Arab nations to discuss. But he has given no indication, in a series of “initiatives,” that Iraqi troops will withdraw or that Baghdad will reverse its declared annexation of the oil sheikdom.

The confrontation, the news agency said Wednesday, “is between right and wrong, between vice and virtue . . . between freedom and the tails of the foreigners.”

In another item, the news agency said two aircraft from Saudi Arabia crossed the southern borders of Iraq, presumably west of Kuwaiti territory, and penetrated 3 miles into Iraqi airspace. It did not identify the type or nationality of the aircraft.

Meanwhile, the Western military buildup continued. The American aircraft carrier Saratoga, escorted by two guided-missile cruisers, passed through the Suez Canal and into the Red Sea, according to reports from Egypt. The Saratoga joins U.S. carrier groups led by the Independence and Eisenhower, raising naval air strength to nearly 200 planes in the tense region.

The carrier Kennedy and its battle group will replace the Saratoga in the eastern Mediterranean.

In Paris, the French government announced that it is sending a detachment of 180 paratroopers to the United Arab Emirates, which on Monday formally confirmed acceptance of foreign troops on its soil. U.S. C-130 transports have been operating out of the Emirates’ Bateen air base since last week.

The Emirates adjoins the key Strait of Hormuz on the Persian Gulf.

Three days earlier, Bahrain approved use of its two air bases by British warplanes, thrusting the two oil sheikdoms into the military confrontation with Iraq. Britain has deployed a squadron of Tornado fighters in Saudi Arabia and a squadron of Jaguars in Oman. In both cases the host governments have the same aircraft, and the deployments ensure a ready stock of spare parts.

The sudden high military profile for the sheikdoms underlines their bond with their large Saudi neighbor which, in the face of the invasion, broke Arab tradition by accepting foreign forces on its territory. All three of the countries, like Kuwait, are governed by hereditary rulers and are dependent on oil.

Meanwhile, it is unclear how King Hussein could shield himself from the political cost of complying with the U.N.-sanctioned trade embargo against Iraq. Applying the sanctions is a sensitive question in Jordan because many here support Saddam Hussein and his policies.

King Hussein has been unwilling to indicate that he will enforce the embargo, describing the invasion of Kuwait as “justified” and saying Iraq is fighting for its “very existence.”

“You can suggest we should block traffic completely across the border,” he responded heatedly to a questioner. “There are so many aspects to the problem. We are trying to work them out as best we can.”

Looking rested but speaking haltingly, the monarch also declined Wednesday to criticize Iraq’s taking of thousands of foreign hostages.

“I hope that, in any event, conditions will improve and these people will be able to return to their countries,” he said. “We have a long record (that) indicates where we stand on freedom of movement.”

One analyst conjectured that Jordan might try to say that the country accepts the sanctions in principle but not put them into effect. As a point of comparison, he noted that Israel accepts U.N. resolutions on withdrawing from the West Bank and Gaza Strip but declines to leave for a variety of reasons.

Western diplomats also have suggested that the United States, which has pressed for full compliance with the embargo, might let Jordan off the hook in order to avoid creating further problems for King Hussein, who is still considered by many to be a friend of the West.

“It would be better to help the king stay in power than to risk the creation of some sort of militant Iraqi puppet or bring a radical Palestinian government to power,” one diplomat said.

Meanwhile, an emergency Arab League meeting to discuss the crisis was postponed until next Thursday.

And in a surprise statement in Cairo, considering Mubarak’s support for the Western deployments in defense of Saudi Arabia, Egyptian Oil Minister Abdel Hadi Kandel, according to the newspaper Gomhouriya, said that Washington is concerned only with petroleum supplies from the Middle East.

“The gulf is nothing more than sand and oil” to the Americans, Kandel was quoted as saying. “The main incentive (for the dispatch of American troops) was not because of one country’s affairs or because a neighboring state toppled a government. It was fear that this (Iraqi) leadership would seize a quarter of the world’s oil reserves and extend to other oil fields.”

Daniel Williams reported from Amman and Nick Williams reported from Manama, Bahrain.