Nuri Al-Maliki

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 10--Iraq’s prime minister appealed on Saturday for international help to sever networks aiding extremists and warned envoys from neighbors and world powers that Iraq’s growing sectarian bloodshed could spill across the Middle East.
“Iraq has become a front-line battlefield,“ Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki told delegates at a groundbreaking conference that brought together Muslim nations, including Iran and western representatives led by the United States, AP reported.
“(Iraq) needs support in this battle that not only threatens Iraq but will spill over to all countries in the region,“ he added, shortly before mortar shells landed near the conference site and a car bomb exploded in a Shiite stronghold across the city.
Maliki urged assistance in stopping financial support, weapon pipelines and “religious cover“ for the relentless attacks of car bombings, killings and other attacks that have pitted Iraq’s Sunnis against majority Shiites.
He expressed hope the conference could be a “turning point in supporting the government in facing this huge danger“.
The one-day gathering also is seen as a prime opportunity for overtures between Iran and the United States, whose chief delegate has left open the door for possible one-on-one exchanges about Iraq.
Iraq’s government spokesman, Ali Al-Dabbaghi, said Iranian and US envoys shook hands during a closed-door discussion session, but it did not appear they attempted “direct talks“ in the conference’s initial stages.
The meeting brought together Iraq’s six neighbors, the five permanent UN Security Council members and several Arab representatives. Its primary goal is to pave the way for a high-level meeting, which was scheduled for next month in Istanbul, Turkey.
Maliki said “the terrorism that kills innocents“ in Iraq comes from the same root as terrorists attacks around the world since Sept. 11, 2001, in a reference to groups inspired by Al-Qaeda.
“Iraq does not accept that its territories and cities become a field where regional and international disputes are settled,“ he said.
The meeting allows ample time for delegates to mingle and open informal contacts. All eyes will be on any attempts to bridge the nearly 28-year diplomatic estrangement between the United States and Iran.
For Iran, opening more direct contacts with Washington could help promote their shared interests in Iraq, including trying to stamp out Sunni-led insurgents. US officials, meanwhile, need the support of Iranian-allied political groups in Iraq to keep a lid on Shiite militias.
Head of Iranian delegation at Baghdad Security Conference, Abbas Araqchi, in a message to the conference on Saturday said the experience of the past four years shows that the presence of foreign troops in Iraq has turned into a serious problem.
“Iraq is presently facing a vicious circle that is occupation of foreign powers as main cause of insecurity and insecurity is a justification for continuing Iraq’s occupation,“ he said.
Araqchi, also deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs, expressed hope for the return of peace and stability to Iraq and Iran’s readiness for helping Iraq in different fields.
He noted that ceding restoration of Iraq’s security to the Iraqis themselves is the most effective way for bringing Iraq out of the prevailing crisis.
“The efforts by the Islamic Republic of Iran in the past four years aimed at restoring peace and security to Iraq shows that Iran is determined to bring about stability to that country,“ Araqchi said.

TEHRAN, March 10--President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Friday the government is doing its best to pursue active diplomacy for defending the ideals of the 1979 Islamic Revolution in international relations.
In a meeting with Muslim authorities and scholars in the holy city of Qom, the chief executive noted that the government has taken a big step in its foreign diplomacy for defending the rights of the Iranian nation, IRNA reported.
Thanking the dignitaries for supporting the government, Ahmadinejad said the government’s success is due to the follow-up of officials and backing of the Iranian nation, particularly the clerics.
Referring to the role of clergymen in different areas, particularly issues related to the Muslim world, the president pointed out that Shiite authorities and scholars have always confronted the enemies under the most difficult conditions.
Ahmadinejad also said the Iranians take pride in following Islamic principles.
Emphasizing the government’s commitment to religious principles, he criticized cynics for their unrealistic propaganda against the government.
“Since my taking office as president, opposition was initiated against the government,“ he said.
Ahmadinejad stressed that the government is doing its best to remove the people’s problems and improve the economic and cultural conditions of the society.
“The cabinet became familiar with people’s problems during its visits to different provinces,“ he said.
During a one-day visit to the holy city of Qom, Ahmadinejad met with Ayatollah Fazel-Lankarani, Ayatollah Nasser Makarem-Shirazi, Ayatollah Safi-Golpayegani, Ayatollah Behjat and Ayatollah Ali Meshkini.

TEHRAN, March 10--Iran’s Interior Ministry has signed a contract valued at $20 billion with China within the framework of the next Iranian year’s (starting March 21) budget bill involving urban development projects, an informed source said on Saturday.
According to the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity to Fars News Agency for lacking authorization to speak to the press, a Chinese-Canadian bank will finance the contract, which will last for 5 to 8 years, and repayment will be both in euro and the US dollar.
“The contract involves 7.5 billion euros and 10.5 billion dollars,“ the source said.
The source noted that 3.9 billion euros of the 7.5 billion euros will be spent on renovating the decrepit textures of metropolises like Tehran, Isfahan, Mashhad and Shiraz.
“Two billion euros will be allocated for development of auto industry, railway and monorail systems,“ the source said, noting that 1.5 billion euros will fund CNG, taxi and vans projects.
“The most important aspect of the contract is the issue of transfer of technology from abroad,“ it said.
The source further said the repayment rate for the loan, as coordinated with the Central Bank of Iran and backed by a CBI guarantee, is on LIBOR (London Interbank Offered Rate) basis minus 0.5 percent of the same rate.
“Allocation of $10.5 billion in different areas, including for the decrepit urban textures, is similar to the euro segment of the loan,“ it added.
Noting that a 17-member Chinese delegation is presently in Iran to finalize the contract, the source said import of buses is also taking place within the framework of this contract.
Iranian experts are exchanging information with Chinese experts about decrepit urban textures and rail and monorail systems.

MOSCOW, March 10--Representatives of the Russian Atomstroiexport Company, constructor of Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, will arrive in Tehran on Sunday to discuss technical and financial issues related to the plant.
Spokeswoman of Atomstroiexport, Irina Jesipova, told IRNA that the Russian delegates will continue previous negotiations with their Iranian counterparts.
“In the negotiations held between the deputy head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, Mohammad Saeedi, and the head of Atomstroiexport, Sergei Shmatko, technical and financial issues of Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant were discussed, including non-payment of dues by Iran,“ she said.
Head of the administration in charge of the plant’s construction, Vladimir Pavlov, told ITAR-Tass that he hopes the Iranian side will prepare the document for resolving the issues related to procurement of financial resources for the Bushehr plant.
The contract was signed by Iran and Russia in 1995. Russia has already delayed the plant’s construction, which usually should take between four to six years, on the pretext of demanding more money.
Iran has proposed that Russia’s Atomstroiexport complete the Bushsher plant by March 31.

KABUL, Afghanistan, March 10--Afghanistan’s lower house of parliament on Saturday voted into law a revised resolution calling for an amnesty for groups suspected of perpetrating war crimes during a quarter century of fighting, but also recognizing the rights of victims to seek justice.
The revised resolution does not protect individuals from prosecution for war crimes, so long as their alleged victims are prepared to raise charges--placing the burden of proof on those who suffered rather than the state, AP reported.
The vote by the overwhelming majority of members present in the Wolesi Jirga came after President Hamid Karzai revised the initial resolution which called for an amnesty from war crimes for all involved in the three decades of fighting.
The decision also came a few days after Afghanistan’s highest body of Islamic clerics ruled that parliament cannot issue a blanket amnesty from war crimes because only the victims of those crimes can forgive the perpetrators.
The revised resolution grants a general amnesty from prosecution to all groups--rather than individual members--who led the anti-Soviet resistance in the 1980s and then plunged the country into a civil war that killed tens of thousands.
Among the alleged war crimes, it is claimed that thousands of civilians in Kabul were killed by indiscriminate shelling and rocketing during the 1992-95 civil war.
In a revision from the original text passed by both houses of the parliament earlier this year and criticized by human rights groups and United Nations, the new resolution recognizes the rights of the victims to seek justice for crimes perpetrated against them during a quarter century of fighting.
New York-based Human Rights Watch has called for some officials, including Vice President Karim Khalili and army Chief of Staff Abdul Rashid Dostum, to face trial before a special court for alleged war crimes.
In a report published last year, it listed Energy Minister Ismail Khan, Karzai’s security adviser Mohammed Qasim Fahim, and lawmaker Abdul Rasul Sayyaf and former President Burhanuddin Rabbani as among the “worst perpetrators“.
The rights group said Mullah Omar and fugitive warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar should also be brought to trial.

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 10--A suicide car bomb struck Baghdad’s Shiite militia stronghold on Saturday, killing at least 18 people as international envoys met in the Iraqi capital to talk about stabilizing the violence-shattered country.
The blast hit an Iraqi patrol in Sadr City at midday, scattering burning debris across a small bridge, witnesses said.
Police said at least 18 people were killed and 48 wounded, AP reported.
In central Baghdad, two mortars fell near Iraq’s Foreign Ministry, where envoys gathered for an international conference on how to quell the violence and bolster Iraq’s government. There were no reports of injuries, but smoke was visible from the meeting area.
Meanwhile, Iraqi officials said they were holding a top Al-Qaeda official, but not the terror mastermind Abu Omar Al-Baghdadi who they believed was captured a day earlier.
“After preliminary investigations, it was proven that the arrested Al-Qaeda person is not Abu Omar Al-Baghdadi but, in fact, another important Al-Qaeda official,“ said Brig. Gen. Qassim Al-Mousawi, an Iraqi military spokesman.
It was Al-Mousawi who announced late Friday that Al-Baghdadi had been captured.
Also Saturday, the US military said it was investigating the shooting of three Iraqis in Baghdad’s Azamiyah neighborhood. American paratroopers fired on a vehicle when it failed to respond to warning signals, the military said in a statement. Three Iraqis were killed and three others were wounded in Friday’s incident, it said.
Gunmen opened fire Saturday on Shiite pilgrims in Latifiyah, about 20 miles south of Baghdad, police said. One person was killed and three were wounded. Later, two more pilgrims were killed in shootings in eastern Baghdad, police said.
The pilgrims were on their way back from a Shiite shrine in Karbala, where millions of faithful were performing rites this weekend for Arbaeen, a holiday that marks the end of a 40-day mourning period after the death anniversary of the Prophet Muhammad’s (PBUH) grandson.
Some 340 people, mostly Shiite pilgrims en route to Karbala, were killed in sectarian attacks this past week.

BEIT-UL-MOQADDAS, March 10--Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has told an investigative panel that Israel began planning for war in Lebanon months before last summer’s conflict against Hezbollah guerrillas, countering criticism that he was caught off guard and acted too hastily in launching the military operation, officials said Friday.
The account, first reported in the Haaretz and Maariv dailies, gave the first details of Olmert’s testimony to the commission investigating the government’s management of the much-criticized war. The commission, whose findings could determine Olmert’s political future, is expected to release a preliminary report in the coming weeks, AP reported.
The 33-day war was triggered last July 12. In his testimony on Feb. 1, Olmert told the commission that he held numerous meetings long before the war to discuss a possible conflict with Hezbollah, Haaretz said Thursday.
Olmert also has been criticized for ordering a large ground assault shortly before the truce went into effect. More than 30 soldiers were killed in the last-minute offensive.