- WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S.
diplomats and intelligence officers are conducting secret talks with Iraq's
Sunni insurgents on ways to end fighting there, Time magazine reported
on Sunday, citing Pentagon and other sources.
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- The Bush administration has said it would not negotiate
with Iraqi fighters and there is no authorized dialogue but the U.S. is
having "back-channel" communications with certain insurgents,
unidentified Washington and Iraqi sources told the magazine.
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- The magazine cited a secret meeting between two members
of the U.S. military and an Iraqi negotiator, a middle-aged former member
of Saddam Hussein's regime and the senior representative of what he called
the nationalist insurgency.
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- A U.S. officer tried to get names of other insurgent
leaders while the Iraqi complained the new Shi'ite-dominated government
was being controlled by Iran, according to an account of the meeting provided
by the Iraqi negotiator.
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- "We are ready to work with you," the Iraqi
negotiator said, according to Time.
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- Iraqi insurgent leaders not aligned with al Qaeda ally
Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi told the magazine several nationalist groups composed
of what the Pentagon calls "former regime elements" have become
open to negotiating.
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- The insurgents said their aim was to establish a political
identity that can represent disenfranchised Sunnis.
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- The White House had no immediate comment on the report.
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- Controversial Iraqi politician Ahmad Chalabi said on
Sunday the outcome of any negotiations between insurgents and the U.S.
military would not be binding for a new Iraqi government.
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- "I know nothing about such negotiations. Those negotiations
will in no way bind the elected government of Iraq," he said. "The
issue here is not negotiating with the killers who are killing the Iraqi
people," he added in an interview with ABC's "This Week."
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