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Middle East
Talabani's Iran visit put on hold
Extension of curfew forces Iraq's president to postpone his Iran trip a second time.
Last Modified: 25 Nov 2006 19:15 GMT
President Talabani was originally due
in Tehran on Saturday

Jalal Talabani will not fly to Tehran on Sunday to meet his Iranian counterpart due to an extension of a curfew and closure of Baghdad airport, according to his spokesman.
 
"It's not happening tomorrow," Hiwa Othman confirmed on Saturday after the government extended the curfew imposed on Baghdad in the wake of bombings which killed 200 people.
 

On Friday, Talabani had said: "The Tehran visit is still on, but the airport is closed. As soon as the airport opens we will leave to Tehran."

Talabani had been originally due to leave for Tehran on Saturday to meet Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, his Iranian president, to discuss the situation in Iraq.
 

"The Tehran visit is still on, but the airport is closed. As soon as the airport opens we will leave to Tehran"

Jalal Talabani
Iraqi President

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Bashar al-Assad, the president of Syria, was supposed to join Talabani and Ahmadinejad this weekend but reports from Tehran said Syria appeared to be staying away from the summit.

 

Meanwhile, a UN envoy has urged Iraq's government to halt a slide into civil war and stop the "cancer" of sectarianism from destroying the country, warning that the carnage of this week could tear Iraq apart.

 

Ashraf Jehangir Qazi said on Saturday car bombs that killed more than 200 Shias and "blind acts of revenge" were "tearing apart the very political and social fabric of Iraq".

 

"No country could tolerate such a cancer in its body politic," he said in a statement.
Source:
Agencies
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