Officials from regional states including Iran and Syria will join US and British envoys at a meeting in Baghdad next month to seek ways to stabilise Iraq, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said on Tuesday.
The White House said Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki had not announced the conference, but if invited, US officials would attend and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would be a logical choice to participate.
The US embassy in Baghdad confirmed Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad would attend. A British embassy spokeswoman said the British would also take part but it was unclear at what level.
The mid-March meeting would be a chance for Western and regional powers to try to bridge some of their differences over Iraq, Zebari said. "Our hope is that this will be an ice-breaking attempt for maybe holding other meetings in the future. We want Iraq, instead of being a divisive issue, to be a unifying issue," Zebari said by telephone from Denmark where he is on a visit. In December, a report by the bipartisan US Iraq Study Group recommended Washington hold direct talks with Damascus and Tehran to persuade them to help stem violence in Iraq.
US President George W. Bush reacted coolly. He has not ruled out a regional conference on Iraq involving Iran and Syria but the White House has indicated Iraq would have to set it up.
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said Maliki had not made any announcement yet about a conference. "Everyone in the region and interested parties has an interest and a stake in making sure that Iraq is a thriving democracy. And so if we were invited we would attend," she said, adding Rice would be a logical choice to take part.
TOUGH NEGOTIATIONS: Iraq has been planning the March meeting for weeks, but until Tuesday it had been expected to involve only officials from countries bordering Iraq and other Muslim states. Zebari said the meeting would involve deputy foreign ministers or senior officials from Iraq's neighbours.
Ambassadors from the five permanent members of the United Nations who are based in Baghdad had confirmed they would take part, he said. "Everybody agreed to attend after tough negotiations," Zebari said. Other participants would come from the United Nations and the Arab League, Zebari said.
Asked if US officials could have separate meetings with the Iranians and Syrians, Zebari said: "We want to put them all in the one hall first, then explore the other possibilities."
Washington accuses Iran of fanning violence in Iraq and has recently presented what the US military says is evidence Iranian-manufactured weapons are being smuggled into Iraq. US officials accuse Syria of allowing foreign fighters to cross its long, porous border with Iraq to join those fighting the US-backed government. Both countries deny the accusations.
Comments
Comments are closed.