Saudi official defends nation's role in Iraq
Says US criticism is misguided
JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia -- Reflecting simmering tensions between Saudi Arabia and the Bush administration, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister yesterday publicly insisted his country was doing all it could to block militants from crossing the border into Iraq as insurgents and said he was "astounded" at recent criticism of its efforts by a senior US official.
The comments by Saud al-Faisal, made at a news conference while flanked by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, came during their visit, which is aimed at pushing Saudi and other Sunni Arab allies to do more to help the Shi'ite-dominated Iraqi government.
The bilateral relationship with Saudi Arabia, one of the most important for the United States in the region, has shown signs of strain in recent months over the situation in Iraq, most publicly when Saudi King Abdullah in March called the US presence in Iraq an "illegal foreign occupation."
Zalmay Khalilzad, the former US envoy to Iraq who recently became the administration's ambassador to the United Nations, hit back a few weeks ago, writing in an opinion piece in The
Although Khalilzad did not mention Saudi Arabia by name in the article, he acknowledged a few days ago that his comments referred in part to Saudi Arabia.
"I was astounded by what he said, especially since we have never heard from him these criticisms when he was here," Faisal said, when asked by reporters about Khalilzad's comments. "I ascribed that to his being in the United Nations in New York and not in Iraq."
Faisal defended his country's record on limiting Saudi nationals from entering Iraq, where Iraqi officials say they make up nearly half of all foreigners fighting Iraqi and US security forces. Faisal insisted Saudi Arabia was already doing "all that we can do" to block extremists traveling into Iraq.
Instead, he pointed the finger at Baghdad, saying a heavier flow of radicals was entering Saudi Arabia from Iraq.
"The traffic of terrorists, I can assure you, is more on this side, coming from Iraq than going from us to Iraq," he said. "This is one of the worries our government has."
Speaking at the same news conference, Rice acknowledged differences on approaches to regional policy but insisted the United States and Saudi Arabia remained close and were working to the same goals.
"If there are problems the United States has with Saudi policy, we talk about it," she said. "If there are problems that Saudi Arabia has with American policy, we talk about it."
Rice said she was particularly encouraged by Riyadh's decision to begin normalizing its relationship with Baghdad. Faisal said he would send a diplomatic mission to Baghdad to discuss opening an embassy, and Rice cited the move as an important step.
"This is something that we have encouraged," Rice said. "Normal relations between Iraq and its neighbors is extremely important in affirming its identity in this part of the world."
A senior Defense official said King Abdullah, who hosted Rice and Gates at an extravagant dinner Tuesday night in the royal palace here, was particularly effusive in his discussion of the importance of bilateral relations. According to US participants, the dinner was held in a grand hall of the palace that had a mosaic-tiled swimming pool at its center and an entire aquarium wall containing exotic fish and sharks. The sharks were fed by unseen caretakers periodically throughout the meal, one participant said.
