Pat Dollard

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Would’ve been nice. And appropriate.

Times Online:

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, will make an unprecedented two-day trip to Baghdad from March 2 to hold talks with the Iraqi Prime Minister and other top officials, an Iraqi government spokesman said today.

The visit, intended to foster relations between the former foes, will mark the first trip to Iraq by a leader of the Islamic Republic since its creation in 1979.

At the same time, Tehran postponed the fourth in a series of landmark talks with Washington in Baghdad on security issues in Iraq. No reason was given. Iran has been highly critical of America’s policy in Iraq, while Washington accuses Tehran of supporting insurgent groups inside the country.

Ali al-Dabbagh, the Iraqi Government spokesman, said that President Ahmadinejad, accompanied by a group of ministers, would meet Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, and Jalal Talabani, the Iraqi President. The Iranian ministers would also hold talks with their counterparts during the trip, which has been anticipated for some weeks.

“Iraq is looking to have good relations with Iran,” Dr Dabbagh told The Times, while adding: “Iran should not interfere with Iraqi internal affairs and [should] respect that Iraq is a sovereign country.”

The two neighbours fought an eight-year war in the 1980s that left an estimated one million people dead or wounded. Relationships have strengthened since the US-led invasion of Iraq five years ago and the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

The United States is uncomfortable about Iran’s growing influence, accusing the Islamic Republic, an overwhelmingly Shia Muslim country, of funding and supplying Shia militia groups in Iraq – a charge that Tehran denies.

The postponed talks between US and Iranian officials were to have taken place tomorrow. Iraqi officials serve as the go-between in arranging the talks and sit in on the discussions.

Mirembe Nantongo, the US Embassy spokeswoman in Baghdad, said: “We have been informed by the Government of Iraq that Iran has again asked to postpone trilateral talks regarding security in Iraq. We have been saying for weeks that we are ready to sit down for talks. It is increasingly clear that Iran is not.”

A comment was not available immediately from the Iranian Embassy in Baghdad.