IRAQ: Iran's ambassdor to Iraq says Iranian consulate in Arbil stormed by United States troops on Januray 11 to be reopened.

Iranian ambassador to Iraq Hassan Kazimi Qomi meets Kurdish leader Masoud Barazani and visits Iranian consulate in Arbil, which was stormed by U.S. troops on January 11, when they arrested five Iranian embassy employees. Qomi says the consulate will reopen shortly and that he has received promises that the arrested Iranians will be released. Iran's ambassador to Iraq Hassan Kazimi Qomi met the President of the region of Kurdistan Masoud Barazani in the northern Iraqi city of Arbil on Sunday (January 21) before visiting the Iranian consulate in the town. Qomi said the consulate, which was damaged on January 11 when U.S, forces stormed it and arrested five Iranian consulate employees, would reopen soon. Qomi said that he has received promises from different Iraqi factions and from some American sides that the five Iranian diplomats will be released soon. "We would like to confirm that this is the Iranian consulate, the Iraqi government, the Iraqi President, Minister of Foreign Affairs, the government of Kurdistan and some American factions have promised us that the five Iranians will be released," Qomi said. The U.S. forces detained five employees, including diplomats and staff, accusing the five who were arrested of having links to an Iranian Revolutionary Guard group that provides weapons to Iraqi insurgents. U.S. President George W. Bush said earlier this month that he would send thousands more U.S. troops to Iraq and pledged to interrupt a "flow of support" to insurgents from Iran. Tehran denies backing the insurgency and blames U.S. troops for the violence and for stoking tensions between Iraq's Shi'ite and Sunni Muslims. The arrests on January 11 were the second such detentions in Iraq in a month, and have further heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran, which are at loggerheads over Iran's nuclear programme.

ITN Source | January 22, 2007

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