| |
US close to security deal with Iraq: Negroponte
Two US blackhawks crash in Baghdad
Arbil—US and Iraqi officials are “very close” to an
agreement on a controversial security pact that would decide the
future of US forces in Iraq, US Deputy Secretary of State John
Negroponte said here on Saturday.
“Negotiations are still on and there are very few issues still
pending,” Negroponte told reporters in Arbil after meeting Massud
Barzani, the president of the northern Kurdish administration of
Iraq.
“We are very close to reaching an agreement. It’s not wise to reveal
the details until we reach a final agreement, and we hope to reach a
final agreement very soon,” said Negroponte, who arrived in Iraq on
Friday on a previously unannounced visit.
Barzani said the deal should be signed as it “was in the interest of
both the parties.”
Washington and Baghdad are trying to hammer out a deal that would
lay the framework for the future of US forces in the
violence-wracked country after 2008, when a UN mandate governing
their presence expires.
But it has been delayed amid differences over certain key issues,
mainly concerning the immunity granted to US soldiers in Iraq and
who would lead the military operations from next year. Iraqi Prime
Minister Nuri al-Maliki last month said the two sides have, however,
agreed to withdraw US forces from Iraqi cities by June 2009 and from
the country by December 2011.
Two US Blackhawk helicop ters crashed in northern Baghdad’s Sunni
district of Adhamiyah late on Saturday, a US military spokesman
said. At least one Iraqi army soldier was killed and four people,
including two US soldiers were wounded, spokesman Lieutenant Patrick
Evans told AFP.
“Two UH-60 Blackhawks have crashed while landing at Combat Outpost
Ford in Adhamiyah (northern Baghdad) about 8:55 p.m. (1755 GMT),”
Evans said.
“One Iraqi army soldier is killed. Two coalition forces (personnel)
and two Iraqi army (soldiers were) wounded,” he said, adding that
the “situation is under control. Emergency services are on the
scene.”
It is not known how many were on board at the time of the incident,
he said.The helicopter crash came 17 days after another US military
helicopter crashed in southern Iraq, killing all seven soldiers
aboard.
The CH-47 Chinook crashed about 100 kilometres (60 miles) west of
the main southern port city of Basra as it formed part of a
four-aircraft convoy flying from Kuwait to the northern city of
Balad.
Meanwhile, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit made a
surprise visit to Iraq on Sunday, the first such trip since 1990,
his office said. The one-day visit is aimed at restoring formal ties
between the two countries, a foreign ministry official said in a
statement.
Cairo has had no official diplomatic representative in Iraq since
the July 2005 abduction and murder by Al-Qaeda of its charged’
affaires in Baghdad, Ihab al-Sharif.
Abul Gheit is being accompanied by Egypt’s Oil Minister Sameh Fahmi,
the state-run news agency reported. The foreign minister said in May
that Cairo was ready to send a fact-finding delegation to Baghdad to
evaluate security conditions for opening an embassy.
“When we set up an embassy in Iraq we want to guarantee that
conditions will be favourable and that its security will not be
undermined,” he said at the time.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in April appealed to Sunni Arab
states to help stabilise Iraq by living up to pledges to forgive his
country’s debts, erasing war reparations and reopening embassies in
Baghdad.
|
