Iran pushes ties with Iraq

TEHRAN, Iran – Iranian officials advocated a close defense relationship with Iraq during meetings Sunday in Tehran with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his subordinates.

The talks came as Tehran grows increasingly concerned that a proposed long-term security agreement between the United States and Iraq would pose a threat to Iran.

Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najar said there were many possibilities for security and defense cooperation between Iran and Iraq, emphasizing what he called “the great strategic potential” of the two oil-rich countries.

“We believe that sustainable Iran-Iraq defense cooperation will play a positive role in promoting long-term peace, security and stability in the Middle East,” Najar said in a meeting with his Iraqi counterpart, Abdul-Qadir Muhammed Jasim.

“Iraq’s ambition to build a strong military calls for further cooperation with Tehran, and for Baghdad to draw on its neighbor’s defense potential,” Jasim said.

With a U.N. mandate authorizing the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq due to expire at the end of the year, the Bush administration has proposed a long-term security agreement that would allow American troops to remain in Iraq.

Iranian politicians and religious figures have criticized the agreement. Former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a cleric and political opponent of the current president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said the pact is meant “to turn the Iraqis into American slaves.”

Iranian authorities, who have repeatedly called for a U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq, have not openly criticized the military aspects of the agreement, but Iranian analysts and Iraqi officials said Maliki’s visit was meant to ease concerns about those specific issues.