IRAQ NEIGHBOURS CALLED ON THE COALITION TO LEAVE BAGHDAD
RIYADH, 18 Apr. (IPS) Three months after a fruitless meeting in Istanbul, foreign affairs ministers of all Iraq’s neighbours, wary of Washington and each other and with shock waves from the stunning U.S. victory still reverberating around the region and the world, met Friday in the Saudi capital of Riyadh to discuss both what Saddam Hoseyn’s fall means for them and find ways and means to prevent a possible American attack on Syria.
The meeting, on the invitation Prince Saud al
Faysal of Saudi Arabia, is the first such forum on postwar Iraq, attended by Turkey,
Iran, Syria, Jordan, Kuwait, plus Egypt as the Arab’s most powerful
nation and Bahrain, the current chair nation of the Arab League.
Almost all the participants had suffered, in one way or another, from the now toppled Iraqi dictator who fought a deadly and ruinous war with Iran from 1980 to 1988 and briefly occupied Kuwait in 1990, threatening Saudi Arabia, leading to the first (Persian) Gulf war.
In his opening statement, Prince Saud criticised what it said were "U.S. threats" against Syria and called for the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq to be "as brief as possible".
"We absolutely refuse the recent threat against Syria which can only increase the likelihood of a new circle of war and hatred, especially in light of the continuing deterioration of the Palestinian situation", he said.
"We call on the United States to use dialogue with Syria and to activate the (Middle East) peace process", he added, welcoming a possible visit to Syria by Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is scheduled to visit the region in the coming weeks, discussing President George W. Bush’s "road map" to end the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, considered by many observers as "the mother of all crisis".
An aide to Powell said he is planning to go to Damascus and meet with President Bashar Asad.
Washington’s hawk accuses Syria of harbouring high-ranking Iraqi officials and developing chemical weapons.
“Syria needs to get out of Lebanon, clean out the terrorists and stop building weapons of mass destruction”, the New York Representative Eliot Engel said in a statement.
Arab officials say the accusations are provoked by Israel, which hopes that pressures the United States applies on Syria would bring Damascus to end its support for both the Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah and radical Palestinian organisations opposed to peace with Israel, groups that have offices in Syria.
The participants also called for the United Nations to play a "vital role" in post-Saddam Iraq, stressing on the necessity to maintain Iraq’s geographical integrity.
"The U.N. should play a pivotal role in both the reconstitution, and giving shape to the future government of Iraq" Iran’s Foreign Affairs Minister Kamal Kharrazi said at the meeting.
"The Islamic Republic of Iran believes in the need to secure the independence and territorial integrity of Iraq; the pulling out of the foreign forces as soon as possible; and providing for the taking control of the Iraqi nation of their country' affairs, that is their most natural right", he added, quoted by the official Iranian news agency IRNA.
Egypt and Syria also said the meeting would ask the United States and Britain to end their occupation of Iraq immediately to pave the way for a government chosen by Iraqis.
"We'll discuss ways and means to help the Iraqi people decide their own future and choose their own government without foreign intervention", said Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher. "This is Iraq, not the United States."
Maher said the ministers agreed on the essential points concerning Iraq’s future. “We have agreed on the need to uphold Iraq’s unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the Egyptian chief diplomat said.
“This requires the withdrawal of foreign forces in order to enable the Iraqi people to choose their government in full freedom. Moreover, the United Nations must play an essential role” in Iraq, he said
But both Washington and London have hinted that they would stay in Iraq for a period of between 6 months to two years, "whatever necessary to promote democracy and freedom in Iraq".
As the ministers were discussing the future of Iraq, in Baghdad, worshippers at the first "free" Friday prayers, most of them Shi’ites, said they wanted an "Islamic-Koranic" regime, highlighting other fears and issues which divides the participants.
"Oppressed since decades and sidelined, the Iraqi Shi’as, who are in majority, do want their share of government", one expert said, adding, "This is exactly what worries Saudi Arabia and Kuwait".
"Turkey, and to a lesser degree Iran, are anxious at the prospect of the Iraqi Kurds proclaiming an independent state of their own", an Ankara-based Iranian journalist pointed out, observing that senior leaders of the Iraqi Kurdish have constantly repeated and assured that they don’t have such a plan, "knowing well that it would never work at present circumstances".
"All want a say in what comes next, now that Saddam has been ousted by US and British forces and a political vacuum has opened at the heart of a volatile region", an Arab political analyst said about the Friday meeting.
Some Iranian analysts doubted decision taken at the Riyadh conference would have any impact on Washington’s course of action for Iraq.
"The Americans are tired of hearing generalities, exercises of futility, a national sport in the Middle East. Hey have proved that they stick to their plans for the region and nothing would change that", he told Iran Press Service. ENDS IRAQ NEIGHBOURS MEETING 18403