In Helsinki, Finland, President Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev agreed anew yesterday on "the path that the U.N. has set" in forcing Iraq to pull its troops out of Kuwait.

But the superpower leaders stopped short of asking each other to take any immediate specific measures to force Iraq from Kuwait.

The joint summit statement called for international monitoring of any humanitarian shipments of food or medicine into Iraq as permitted under the U.N. embargo.

An American Red Cross spokesperson, Ann Stingle, said her organization will not participate in monitoring such shipments. The decision was made because Iraq last week refused to allow Swiss Red Cross officials to visit foreigners held in Iraq and Kuwait, she said in Washington.

Iraq's one million-member army has deployed an estimated 260,000 troops along with hundreds of tanks in and around Kuwait since seizing its oil-rich southern neighbor in a dispute over oil, land and money.

About 100,000 U.S. soldiers are dug into the Saudi Arabian desert south of the Kuwaiti border along with several thousand Arab troops. Scores of U.S. and other warships have assembled in the Persian Gulf region, where they are enforcing the U.N.-sanctioned embargo on trade with Iraq.

Six French combat helicopters and 100 soldiers began heading for Saudi Arabia yesterday. France has deployed more than 7000 troops in the gulf region, most of them aboard warships.

The flow of refugees from Iraq and Kuwait continued yesterday. Thousands more Asians and Arabs crossed into Turkey and Jordan and more American women and children were scheduled to fly out of Iraq.

A U.S.-chartered flight carrying about 300 Americans landed in Frankfurt, West Germany, early yesterday from Amman, Jordan. After refueling, the flight took off for Charleston, S.C.

An Iraqi Airways jumbo jet carrying 426 evacuees--including 170 Americans--left Baghdad bound for London, said officials at Gatwick airport near London.