Although the US is resisting pressure to deal with Iran's nuclear ambitions through direct talks with Tehran, rather than sanctions or military strikes, it still intends to meet senior Iranian officials for discussions on Iraq at which it will demand an end to Iranian meddling, according to Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador in Baghdad.
He is to head the US team at face-to-face talks, which will be the first formal diplomatic meeting between the two countries since the Islamic revolution in 1979 and are expected to open in Baghdad shortly. Leading Republican and Democratic senators have urged the Bush administration to engage Iran in full-scale talks, but in an interview with the Guardian Mr Khalilzad made it clear that the talks would be limited to Iraq. The US wanted Iran to halt aid to Iraq's sectarian militias, and stop smuggling al-Qaida fighters and weapons across the border, he said.
He criticised Iranian "negative propaganda". "The Shias have been the main beneficiaries of this change, yet Iran has been very critical of the liberation and the liberators," he said. "A lot of media in Iran exaggerate the problems here ... They are inciting people against the forces that have come to liberate Iraq."The talks with Iran have the backing of Iraqi leaders, who also insist on their own representation at the table. "We have no objection," Mr Khalilzad told the Guardian. "We're not going to negotiate on behalf of Iraq." The talks were put on hold until Iraq had a new government because "in this part of the world people always think in great conspiracy theories ... We didn't want people here to think that the Iranians and the Americans are together deciding on the Iraqi government."
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At the forthcoming talks, the US envoy will speak to the Iranians in their own language. Mr Khalilzad was born in Afghanistan in 1951 and his mother tongue is Dari, which differs little from Farsi. The third US overlord in Baghdad since the invasion, Mr Khalilzad is considered the most successful. As a Muslim, educated in Beirut, he understands local culture. But in a constant reminder of the risks he runs, he keeps a tailor's dummy draped with his flak jacket and helmet in his office. Mr Khalilzad is a neo-con who felt the US should have toppled Saddam Hussein after expelling him from Kuwait in 1991. His technique for countering the fall in support for the war in US opinion polls is to offer lurid scenarios for what might happen "if we were to leave prematurely before Iraq can stand on its own feet".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1755750,00.html
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