Saturday, May 31, 2008

Iran Urges Iraqis to Resist US Military Pact


Al-Manar

"30/05/2008 Iran's Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani has urged Iraqis to resist a pact under discussion to extend the US occupation troop presence there beyond 2008, the official IRNA news agency reported on Friday.

"The Iraqi nation should courageously resist the US security pact just as they have so far resisted the occupiers," Larijani said in a speech in the religious city of Qom on Thursday.

"The occupiers' withdrawal is the only way to implementing security in Iraq," he said, describing the military agreement as a "challenge threatening the Iraqi people and government."
IRAQ-US SECURITY PACT 'FACES SETBACKS'
Meanwhile, a senior Iraqi official has said that negotiations between the US and Iraqi government over a security agreement to extend US troops presence in Iraq beyond 2008 has hit snag.......

Qandil said: "What is important at this stage is discussion over the principles and codes determining the details of the agreement." "These principles include respect to the Iraqi government's sovereignty, safeguarding the country's independence, removing the country from the UN charter's Chapter Seven, attempts to end the foreigners' presence in the country and taking from them the entire responsibility for establishing security, transparency regarding the items of the agreement, and making it public for the people's knowledge," he said.

The Iraqi official said that "rejecting the idea of establishing any US military base in the country is one of the crucial conditions of the agreement which has been defined by the Iraqi National Security Council, and the US forces continue their presence in the country as long as the Iraqi forces need them in their security missions."

Qandil also said: "All that has been said and raised about the agreement are merely the media comments and viewpoints; nothing has been formally released of the agreement yet; the agreement is now a draft and can be modified or changed." The advisor to the Iraqi vice president further said: "Once the agreement is signed, it would be decided on by the Iraqi parliament and political parties and, finally, it would be put to a plebiscite." Qandil also said that his country will never be used for launching attacks against other countries, "for this would be against the Iraqi Constitutions.""

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