Key Muslim states reject US plea for help in Iraq

PUTRAJAYA, Malaysia, Oct 13 (AFP) - Key Muslim nations Monday ruled out sending troops to help the United States in Iraq without a UN mandate, leaving Turkey isolated at the world's biggest gathering of Islamic states.

Washington has asked Pakistan, Bangladesh and Turkey to deploy soldiers to ease the burden on US forces confronting mounting opposition in Iraq, but only Turkey has agreed.

BizVantage – A Net clipping service that learns what you need: for business, investment or technology.
Try the free, no-hassle 6 month trial!

Pakistan's Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri told AFP his country did "not want to be perceived as an extension of the occupation force."

Kasuri, who is attending a meeting of foreign ministers preparing for a summit Thursday of the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), said Pakistan would only despatch troops under a United Nations banner and if other Muslim nations agreed to participate.

"So the minimum requirement after a UN resolution is that Pakistan does not go alone, that there are other Muslim countries and it will be much better if we are invited by some established Iraqi authority."

Kasuri said Pakistan had no plans to make a formal request for the OIC to send troops to Iraq as a collective effort but it would "talk informally to other Muslim countries" once a UN resolution was approved.

Bangladesh, a regular contributor of peacekeeping troops around the world, echoed Pakistan's position, with Foreign Minister Morshed Khan telling reporters here that his country would only send troops "if the UN gets a central role under the UN blue helmets."

And Jordan's King Abdullah II, who is due at the summit, said during a visit to Singapore Monday that no troops from Turkey or other neighbouring countries should be involved in Iraq.

Abdullah said Iraq's neighbours were incapable of being "honest" if their military forces were sent in to help the United States conduct peacekeeping operations.

Turkey's decision to send up to 10,000 troops for a maximum of a year has already drawn fire from the US-appointed Governing Council in Iraq, which fears the presence of a neighbouring army could destabilise domestic politics.

An Arab diplomat attending the OIC conference said that while Turkey's decision was not formally on the table here, an overwhelming majority of states would oppose the deployment without a UN mandate.

Instead, speakers at the opening session of the ministerial meeting pressed the US to commit itself to a specific timetable for the withdrawal of its forces from Iraq and a handover of control to the UN ahead of elections and independence.

This was one of three themes that dominated the session, along with fierce condemnation of Israel and anger over the treatment of Muslim states since the September 11 terror attacks on the US.

A special resolution condemning Israel for its strike on an alleged militant base in Syria a week ago is being prepared, with Malaysia's Foreign Minister calling the attack "provocative, arrogant and dangerous."

OIC secretary general Abdelouahed Belkeziz, turning to the upheaval in global politics since the attacks on the US, said the summit came at a time of "challenges and dangers unprecedented in the contemporary history of the Islamic nation."

"Islam itself is being accused in its culture, civilisation and speech.

"Muslims are filled with feelings of impotence and frustration as some of their countries are occupied, others are under sanctions, a third group threatened and a fourth group accused of sponsoring terrorism."

The conference, the biggest Islamic gathering since 9/11, is taking place amid tight security in Malaysia's new administrative capital of Putrajaya south of Kuala Lumpur.

bur-lb/th

OIC-summit