Jordan Times
Monday, March 22, 2004
Iraq unity ‘safety valve,' King tells Zebari
By Alia Shukri Hamzeh
AMMAN, March 22 - His Majesty King Abdullah on Sunday said Iraqis' unity and determination to reconstruct their war-torn country would be a “safety valve” against attempts at division and allotment.
King Abdullah told visiting Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari that Jordan is still committed to support the reconstruction of the neighboring country and help it restore independence and sovereignty, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.
For his part, Zebari expressed Iraq's gratitude, hailing Jordan's efforts to train Iraqi military and police officers. Jordan has been training Iraqi military and police as part of a plan to create an army by Sept. 30.
In remarks to the press, Zebari said Iraq's military and police forces were still unequipped to deal with the grave security situation in Iraq, especially in countering attacks and border infiltration by what he labeled as “Muslim extremists.”
“We face a big security problem resulting from the attacks that are carried out by Islamic groups that come from outside the country and have infiltrated our borders,” Zebari told journalists following a meeting with Foreign Minister Marwan Muasher.
He called on the Kingdom and other neighboring countries to exert all efforts to prevent such groups from crossing into Iraq and asked for greater political support to help the battered country deal with its current difficult and critical stage.
Muasher, meanwhile, reiterated Jordan's pledges to help Iraq prevent foreign fighters from crossing their shared border, saying intelligence coordination and training of Iraqi troops would help curb the phenomena.
Muasher said Jordan strongly believes in the need to rebuild Iraq's security capabilities in order to address the difficult situation there. That is why, he said, the Kingdom was training 35,000 members of the Iraqi police force and several thousand of the military. Muasher also announced that both countries have agreed to form a joint committee that will group representatives from all ministries and will be charged with addressing outstanding issues, including the estimated $500 million of Iraqi assets frozen in Jordan and the claims of Jordanian businessmen in Iraq.
Marking one year into the US-led war on Iraq, Zebari said “Iraqis believe the war was justified.”
“We are going through a critical transitional phase. Yesterday marked the first anniversary for the war, but we as Iraqis, feel and believe this war was justified,” he said, adding the Iraqi people suffered a great deal from the injustice inflicted by the former regime.
“The Iraqi people were eager for freedom,” he said, noting the recently discovered mass graves, past wars and their repercussions. He added that the Iraqi people want to build a new country that was not considered as an “outlaw state,” but rather one in peace with itself and others. “Our aim is to build a new, united and democratic Iraq,” he said.
Zebari called on Arab leaders, to meet in Tunisia later this month for the Arab summit, to support ongoing efforts towards regaining sovereignty and independence.
He said the occupied country would be open to and positively deal with democratic reform initiatives, expected to be presented at the summit.
“We agreed that any reform plan should come from within the region and not imposed from outside,” he said, referring to US' “Greater Middle East” democratic reform initiative - to be discussed during the summit.
Iraq will be represented in Tunis by its US-appointed interim Governing Council.
Zebari, who also met with Prime Minister Faisal Fayez, noted that the Governing Council would seek a UN Security Council resolution that would legitimize the June 30 transfer of power from the coalition troops to Iraqis.
“We in the Governing Council have officially called on the UN to help come up with a specific mechanism for handing down the authority, and we would ask for a new UN resolution to give legitimacy to the power transfer process,” Zebari said, adding that the issue was receiving approval from decision making countries and UN Security Council members. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan announced he would send a political team to Iraq to advise Baghdad on a transitional government as well as local elections slated for early next year.