Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Apr. 04 Talks between Iran and the United States over the situation in Iraq will take place this coming Saturday, an Iranian government-owned news agency reported on Tuesday. Iran Focus
Tehran, Iran, Apr. 04 Talks between Iran and the United States over the situation in Iraq will take place this coming Saturday, an Iranian government-owned news agency reported on Tuesday.
Mehr news agency quoted an unnamed official in Irans Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) as saying that the Iranian delegation would be led by either Ali Hosseini-Tash or Aziz Jaafari, both of whom are brigadier generals of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and now hold senior positions in the SNSC.
The report said that Iranian Foreign Ministry officials will also take part in the meeting which would be held in Baghdad.
The talks would be held before the cameras at the request of Iran, the official said.
U.S. President George W. Bush has authorised the American ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, to discuss the security situation in Iraq with Iran. The United States and Iraqi officials routinely blame Tehran for aiding the insurgency.
The report quoted Iran’s charge d’affaires in Iraq, Hassan Kazemi Qomi, as saying that an Iraqi representative would also participate in the talks. Kazemi Qomi, who will take part in the talks, was appointed as Irans chargé-d’affaires in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Husseins regime. He is a veteran officer of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards and was once the IRGCs liaison to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
