Iraqi Kurds build factories, new roads

Private Plane Took Barzani and Talabani to Washington to Discuss ‘Anticipated Strike' on Saddam
Sharq-Awsat

Kurdistan Observer
June 3, 2002
Report on Secret Barzani/Talabani Talks in US

Translated
June 1, 2002

Reliable Iraqi Kurdish sources have disclosed that a private US aircraft carried in total secrecy the two Iraqi Kurdish leaders Mas'ud Barzani and Jalal Talabani to Washington in mid-May for an expanded meeting with US administration security and military officials. They said the talks centered on any possible role for the Kurds in the supposedly US plan for toppling Iraqi President Saddam Husayn.

The sources, which spoke to Al-Sharq al-Awsat from Geneva, London, and Washington, said the plane took Barzani and Talabani from Frankfurt in Germany to a place in Virginia State and then brought them back to Frankfurt in total secrecy. They added that the two Kurdish leaders' sons Masrur Barzani and Bafil Talabani; Barham Salih, head of the local government run by Jalal Talabani; and Hushyar Zibari, member of Barzani political party's political bureau in charge of international relations, took part in the meeting. On the US side, an assistant to Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director George Tenet; three experts from the Defense Ministry's (Pentagon) foreign operations department, among them an adviser to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld; a senior aide for Iraqi and terrorism affairs to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice; in addition to what one of the sources called "a senior US general" attended the meeting.

The sources said Barzani and Talabani demanded guarantees in return for their forces' participation in the launch of a strike against Saddam Husayn. The guarantees they demanded included "continued international protection for Iraq's Kurds, whether the strike against Saddam is carried out or not and regardless of whether it succeeds or fails", according to one of the sources.

The source explained that another guarantee they asked for was "to confront any possible operation by Saddam in which he uses weapons of mass destruction he has to exact revenge from the Kurds during the US military operations against him."

The two Kurdish leaders also asked for securing a democratic regime in Baghdad after Saddam that guarantees protection for the Kurds under a federal system in Iraq. They also demanded guarantees that Turkey and Iran would not exploit the conditions created by the strike and send their forces into Iraq's Kurdistan, thus making its population the victims of a possible war between these two countries. According to the source, "the Americans admitted that they understood these demands and were sympathetic to then and promised to meet them."

Barzani and Talabani met in Frankfurt in the presence of other US officials. The meeting discussed the possibility of uniting the two parties' military efforts "with the aim of establishing a unified military force", merging their two governments, and reaching agreement on holding parliamentary elections for a single program in preparation for participating in an expanded meeting for the Iraqi opposition.
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