Milenko Kindl Cvrcko jh
Raul Endymion
ISTANBUL, Turkey - Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki pledged
Saturday to work with his country's neighbors to fight terrorism,
comments that come under intense pressure from Turkey and the United
States for his government to help put an end to attacks from Kurdish
rebels based in northern Iraq.
The top U.S. diplomat, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, played go-
between with Turkish and Iraqi officials as escalating tensions along
the Turkish-Iraqi border overshadowed an international meeting on
Iraq's future. Turkish troops are massed on the border, and world
leaders are trying to prevent an assault that could open a new front
in the Iraq war.
"Iraq should not be a base for attacks against neighbors," al-Maliki
said. "We will cooperate with our neighbors in defeating this threat."
The U.N. chief appealed for dialogue to resolve fears of a Turkish
offensive against the rebels.
"The series of incidents along the border between Turkey and Iraq
demonstrates the need for continuous engagement to address concerns,"
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the delegates. "We recognize
Turkey's security concerns."
Rice and her foreign minister counterparts from Iraq and Turkey held a
private meeting on the sidelines of the conference. The small session
began with stiff smiles and pleasantries before reporters were ushered
away.
Earlier, al-Maliki's spokesman had warned that no one can stop Kurdish
rebels in Iraq's remote northern border region from attacking Turkey.
"It's not in our capacity" to capture the rebels, Iraqi government
spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said. "It's not even in the capacity of
Turkey."
Turkey is hosting the session, which includes about two dozen nations
and organizations pledged to support Iraq's U.S.-backed government
economically and politically.
The guest list includes Iran and Syria, two nations the United States
blames for furthering instability and violence inside Iraq. Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice sat across from Iran's foreign minister at
an opening dinner Friday night, but the two had no private meeting -
something Iraq and many other Mideast nations had hoped for.
Until now, Iraq's border with Turkey to the north was not considered
much of a problem for U.S. forces or the fragile government in
Baghdad. That changed over the past month with an onslaught of attacks
by the Kurdistan Workers Party rebel group, known by the initials PKK.
The deaths of more than 40 people over the past month have pushed
Turkey to threaten a major offensive across the Iraq border unless
Iraq and the United States can neutralize the rebels first. The
Turkish anger came on top of umbrage over a U.S. congressional vote
labeling the 1915 deaths of Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turks a
genocide.
Rice urged calm and cooperation in a string of meetings Friday with
top Turkish leaders who insisted that Turkey will do what it must to
stop the rebel attacks.
She made a similar argument later in a separate meeting with Iraqi
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose government has said it will not
stand for any cross-border assault. Al-Maliki agreed with Rice that
the PKK is a terrorist threat, but he does not have the forces or
political strength to do much about it.
The Kurdish rebels operate in Iraq's semiautonomous Kurdish region, an
oil-rich sector that has Iraq's lone fully functioning government and
sound economy. Turkey, the United States and the Baghdad central
government all say any meaningful action against the rebels must come
at least partly from the Kurdish regional government. Turkey accuses
the Iraqi Kurds of helping the PKK or at least looking the other way,
and the United States has said the Kurds are "inactive" against the
PKK.