Iraq PM urges others to stay out of Iraq conflict

Iraq's prime minister urged regional rivals yesterday to stop using Iraq as a battlefield to fight out their proxy wars, addressing a meeting at which US officials sat down with adversaries from Iran and Syria.

The conference in Baghdad aimed to stop sectarian warfare in Iraq and prevent the conflict's spread throughout the region. At the end of the one-day conference, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said the meeting had achieved good results and that US and Iranian delegates did engage in discussions but only about their relations in Iraq.

"The meeting was constructive and positive in fact in its atmosphere and the composition," Zebari told a news conference after the meeting. "The issues discussed in the meeting were totally focused on Iraq's security and stability."

The US ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad said he talked directly to Iranian delegates as well as in a group setting during the conference. In his opening speech, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said all those with a stake in the peace of the Middle East should stand firm against terrorism in Iraq.

"We call on all to take moral responsibility by adopting a strong and clear stance against terrorism in Iraq and co-operate in stamping out forces of terror," Maliki said.

Shortly after the meeting started, two mortar rounds, crashed near the conference venue around lunchtime, and a car bomb in the Shi'ite militia stronghold of Sadr City miles away from the Foreign Ministry killed six and wounded 20, police said.

Washington has accused Iran and Syria of fomenting violence in Iraq, charges both countries deny. Security officials in the region say Sunni extremists from neighbouring Saudi Arabia and Syria are also entering Iraq. Iran is a key ally of the Shi'ite majority in Iraq, while Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Arab states have been traditional allies of the Sunni minority. Khalilzad urged Iraq's neighbours to do more to stop the flow of fighters, weapons and sectarian propaganda contributing to the violence, saying the future of Iraq and the Middle East was the defining issue of the moment.

"No country represented at the table would benefit from a disintegrated Iraq; indeed, all would suffer badly," he said. He hoped their presence indicated they were "ready to take concrete, constructive actions" to support Iraq.

He said US Secretary Condoleezza Rice would attend a planned ministerial meeting of regional and world powers on Iraq expected to be held in Istanbul in April.

Besides finding ways to stop the bloodshed in Iraq, the one-day meeting was a rare opportunity for old foes the United States, Iran and Syria to sit at the same table. Washington, which has no diplomatic relations with Iran, has had contacts with Iranian officials in group settings, including as recently as September, but has resisted bilateral talks.