Iran will tell the United States and Britain to get their troops out of Iraq and leave the problem for neighbouring countries to sort out when regional and Western foreign ministers, including the US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, meet at a special Iraq summit in Egypt starting on Friday.
Although no bilateral meetings between Rice and her Iranian counterpart, Manouchehr Mottaki, have been planned in advance, both sides have indicated willingness to talk on the sidelines of the Sharm el-Sheikh conference about Iraq’s security, including insurgent activities and border issues.
But Iran’s message, whether delivered across the conference table or in private, is likely to be an uncompromising one, officials here indicated.
”We believe it would be to the benefit of both the occupiers and the Iraqi people that they [the coalition forces] withdraw immediately,” said Mohammad Reza Bagheri, deputy foreign minister for Arabic and African affairs with primary responsibility for Iran’s policy in Iraq.
”In Iraq there is an elected government and Parliament and the other government institutions are functioning. They must be allowed to do as they wish. It is better that the US and Britain withdraw and let neighbouring countries assist them. ”Neighbouring countries are not willing to ransack the country. They do not want what is not theirs,” Bagheri added.
David Satterfield, the state department’s Iraq coordinator, said this week that the US would not spurn the opportunity for a ”useful dialogue” with Iran.
Satterfield said Rice would call for an end to Iranian involvement in the infiltration of foreign jihadis and weapons into Iraq, as well as a halt to Iranian training of Shia militiamen.
Opposition sources say Iran continues to operate training camps for Shia fighters in Tehran and near the city of Shiraz, in southern Iran.
In an interview at the foreign ministry in Tehran, Bagheri said Iran viewed such allegations as false propaganda intended to discredit the Islamic revolution and divide the Muslim world. — Â