| Submit your comments on this article |
| Iraq |
| Khalizhad in talks with hard boyz |
| 2006-04-07 |
| The US ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, has said US officials have held talks with some groups linked to the Sunni-led Iraqi insurgency. Mr Khalilzad told the BBC that, in his opinion, the talks had had an impact as the number of attacks on US troops by Iraqi militants had fallen. But he stressed he would not negotiate with "Saddamists" or terrorists seeking a war on civilisation. Mr Khalilzad also warned a civil war in Iraq remained a real risk. Mr Khalilzad would not specify which groups the US had had contact with other than to say it would not talk to people he called "Saddamists" or terrorists seeking a war on civilisation. That is usually a reference to al-Qaeda figures such as the Jordanian militant, Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. However, the ambassador said militia groups, which he described as the infrastructure of civil war, were just as much of a problem. Mr Khalilzad is seen as one of the architects of US President George W Bush's decision to overthrow Saddam Hussein three years ago. He has been more prepared than most US officials to admit things have not worked out as planned. He said the risk of sectarian war breaking out in Iraq remains if ethnic divisions between its Kurdish and majority Arab population developed, and warned it could turn into a wider regional conflict. "Iraq must succeed," he said. "Not to do everything humanely possible to make this country work would have the most serious consequences for the Iraqis, for sure, but also for the region and for the world." With talks over forming a new Iraqi government still deadlocked almost four months after elections, the ambassador said the patience of the international community with the country's political leaders was running out. Mr Khalilzad, who was born in Afghanistan, was the US ambassador there before his current posting. Asked if Iraq could do with a political figure who could reach across ethnic and sectarian divides, similar to the Afghan President Hamid Karzai, he agreed such a person would be an asset. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |