Iraqis ”don’t have a future” if they give in to the sectarian tensions that are tearing apart their society, United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said during a visit to Vietnam on Saturday in one of the starkest warnings on the present violent trajectory of the country.
Her comments emerged amid a tranche of bleak prognoses for the region — including one by America’s most senior military officer in the Middle East, General John Abizaid, who warned that if the world does not find a way to stem the rise of violent Islamic militancy, it will face a third world war.
The sense of crisis engulfing US and United Kingdom policy over Iraq came amid an increasingly desperate search in Washington and London for a meaningful strategy that would prevent the country fragmenting into a catastrophic civil war that neighbours now fear would destabilise the entire region.
In Iran, which has always opposed the presence of US troops in its neighbour, signs of unease have begun to grow since the Democratic victory in Congress in the mid-term elections over the wider consequences of a precipitate American withdrawal.
”[Iraqis] have one future and that is a future together. They don’t have a future if they try to stay apart,” Rice said in a speech on the sidelines of an Asia Pacific summit. ”I don’t mean to diminish the difficulties we have in Iraq and that the Iraqi people have in Iraq. This is difficult going.”
Rice was speaking as Gordon Brown made a surprise visit — his first — to meet UK troops in Iraq and pledged an extra £100-million to help rebuild the economy. Iraq’s sectarian violence has been escalating for months as Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has shown himself unwilling and unable to disband militias and death squads operating with impunity.
Amid growing pressure on the Bush administration to regionalise efforts to end the violence — including from Tony Blair, who last week called for talks with Iran and Syria — it was revealed that former US Secretary of State James Baker, co-chairperson of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, which is examining strategic options in Iraq, had met Syrian officials several times to discuss cooperation with the US.
The Bush administration withdrew its ambassador to Damascus and has stated it will not authorise higher level contacts because of Syria’s suspected role in supporting terror groups, Iraqi insurgents and opponents of Lebanon’s government.
However the Syrian ambassador told the New York Times on Friday that Baker had asked Syria’s Foreign Minister, Walid Muallem, during a meeting in New York in September: ”What would it take Syria to help on Iraq?”
Earlier in the week it was reported that Baker had also had a three-hour dinner in New York with Iran’s United Nations ambassador Javad Zarif. Although Baker apparently made clear that he was not negotiating for the US, he is understood to have told the ambassador that his group wanted Iran’s ”input and suggestions”.
On Tuesday, Tehran’s English-language news channel featured commentary from political scientist Pirouz Mojtahedzadeh calling for the US to remain in Iraq until it has established a strong, stable central government capable of providing adequate security.
”The Americans can’t simply withdraw from Iraq, leaving the mess as it is,” he said in a telephone interview from Tehran afterward. ”Who’s going to look for the safety of the Iraqis there? The Iranians can’t do it. The Turks can’t do it …
”This is not a question of political rivalry between Iran and the West. It has to do with the fact that the society has to have a government structure in place.”
Though it is not clear how much support his comments have in hard-line circles, some analysts were interpreting them as expressing the desire for a withdrawal following a timetable, rather than the quick exit favoured by some Democrats.
Revelation of the meetings has come amid widespread speculation that when he reports to Bush, Baker will advocate greater US cooperation with Syria and Iran as the administration considers a change in course on the war after voters vented their anger in the elections.
The latest moves were disclosed as British troops, backed by US military helicopters, battled insurgents near the Kuwaiti border, close to where a private security team of four Americans and an Austrian were kidnapped in the biggest kidnapping of US citizens since the invasion in 2003.
Gunmen wearing police uniforms had abducted the security team near Safwan, a largely Sunni Arab city of 200 000 in southern Iraq. The attack took place shortly after the Westerners had crossed the border with a convoy of supply trucks.
Although the area is largely Shi’ite there are a number of Sunni pockets spread along the area of the Kuwait border. The convoy was travelling on the Iraq Military Road, which is infrequently used by civilian vehicles.
Elsewhere, at least 52 other Iraqi deaths were reported on Friday: 15 killed by gun or mortar fire and 37 bodies were found with multiple bullet wounds; many showed signs of torture. The US military also reported the death of a soldier who was killed on Thursday in Diyala Province, north-east of Baghdad. — Guardian Unlimited Â