Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on an unprecedented visit to Iraq, was aiming to build ties with officials from a once-hated neighbor and to accuse the US of spreading terrorism.
The two-day visit was thick with symbolism as both the US and Iran seek to influence Iraq's future.
Ahmadinejad said talks on Sunday with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Sunni Kurd who told the Iranian leader to call him "Uncle Jalal," were "brotherly."
Then Ahmadinejad cut through the US-controlled Green Zone to visit Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a fellow Shiite, at his Cabinet offices.
The sprawling Green Zone contains the core of the US diplomatic mission to Iraq -- including a massive new embassy -- and is heavily protected against occasional rocket attacks, which US officials have blamed on Iranian-backed Shiite extremists.
Ahmadinejad denied the charges at least twice during news conferences throughout Sunday.
"Six years ago, there were no terrorists in our region. As soon as the others landed in this country and the region, we witnessed their arrival and presence," he said on Sunday night after meeting Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of Iraq's largest Shiite political bloc.
Earlier, Ahmadinejad said that "such accusations increase the problems of the Americans in the region. The Iraqi people do not like the Americans."
The Iranian delegation seemed to enjoy the contrast between Ahmadinejad's visit and trips to Iraq by US President George W. Bush.
Ahmadinejad announced the dates of his visit in advance, landed at Baghdad International Airport in daylight and drove through the capital, albeit in a heavily guarded convoy, on a relatively quiet day. Iraqi forces provided security.
The Iranian leader also visited the holy Shiite shrine of Imam Mousa al-Kadim around midnight. He traveled in a motorcade under tight security through Baghdad's streets to the shrine in the northern Kazimiyah district, about 12km from al-Hakim's headquarters where he departed.
In contrast, Bush's visits are typically a surprise and involve trips mostly to US military bases, like his journey to an air base in Anbar Province last September.
The day before the Iranian president arrived, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, came to Baghdad unannounced to visit with commanders and Iraqi officials.
Bush on Saturday advised al-Maliki to tell Ahmadinejad to "quit sending in sophisticated equipment that's killing our citizens."
Rear Admiral Gregory Smith, a military spokesman, reiterated on Sunday that the US hoped the Iranian-Iraqi meetings produce "real and tangible results," which in the US view would include Iran ending its alleged training and funding of extremists.
The tone among Ahmadinejad and his Iraqi hosts, meanwhile, was more than cordial.
"We had very good talks that were friendly and brotherly," Ahmadinejad said after meeting with Talabani, who greeted him with an honor guard and a band that played both countries' national anthems. "We have mutual understandings and views in all fields, and both sides plan to improve relations as much as possible."
After a meeting involving Ahmadinejad, al-Maliki and their advisers, the Iraqi prime minister said the visit was "an expression of the strong desire of enhancing relations and developing mutual interests after the past tension during the dictatorship era."
Ahmadinejad was set to meet with Talabani again yesterday before returning to Tehran.
Meanwhile, a car bomb killed at least 16 people and wounded 45 in central Baghdad yesterday, an Iraqi security official said.
The bomb detonated near a labor ministry building in a commercial area of the Bab al-Muazam neighborhood.
The wounded included ministry employees and students from the nearby Baghdad University, the official said.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver