Rebels attack Iraqi police station, kill four

By Ross Colvin

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Rebels blasted an Iraqi police station
with grenade and mortar fire before dawn on Wednesday, killing
four policemen in Madaen, south of Baghdad, police said.

They said they had detained about 70 suspects in raids in
the town after the assault, which occurred a day after at least
22 people were killed and 30 prisoners released in a similar
attack on a police post northeast of the capital.

Among the detainees was a Syrian found with leaflets by the
leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, police said.

The violence again underlined the need for Iraq’s leaders
to break a deadlock over a government of national unity, widely
seen as the best of hope of stabilizing the country and
undermining support for a tenacious Sunni Arab insurgency.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Tuesday
approved rare talks with Washington on Iraq, where Shi’ite
Islamists with links to Tehran lead the interim government.

Some Iraqi officials hope U.S.-Iranian contacts could ease
the political logjam, which is due partly to rifts among
Shi’ite parties as well as those involving Kurds and Sunni
Arabs.

However, statements by U.S. and Iranian leaders before the
talks have reflected the mutual hostility and suspicion that
have plagued relations since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

“If Iranian officials can express Iran’s opinion about Iraq
to Americans and make them understand Iran’s views, talks on
this issue are not problematic,” Khamenei, who has the final
say in all state matters, said in the northeastern city of
Mashhad.

“But if (talks) mean opening up an arena for deceitful
Americans to continue their bullying attitude, talks with
America on Iraq are banned,” he said in a televised speech.

AMERICAN CHARGES

U.S. President George W. Bush, who is leading international
efforts to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions, said on Tuesday
Washington would tell Tehran in the talks that it would not
accept attempts to spread sectarian violence in Iraq.

Tehran denies U.S. charges it is stirring communal
bloodshed in Iraq or supplying material for insurgent roadside
bombs.

The Iranians are also wary of helping the United States
stabilize Iraq without getting a reward. They recall that they
joined efforts to promote an Afghan national unity government
in 2001, only for Bush to brand Iran part of an “axis of evil,”
along with Saddam’s Iraq and North Korea, early the next year.

Iraqi political sources said they expected the U.S.
Ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, to meet Iran’s
representatives as early as this week.

Three months after a parliamentary election, Iraqi factions
remain deadlocked over how a national unity government should
function and whether it should be led by interim Prime Minister
Ibrahim al-Jaafari, nominated by the main Shi’ite alliance.

Bush also said on Tuesday that U.S. troops may be in Iraq
after the end of his presidency in three years’ time. U.S.
officials have long resisted setting a timetable for
withdrawing American forces, now 133,000-strong.

“That will be decided by future presidents and future
governments of Iraq,” Bush told a White House news conference
when asked when all U.S. forces would finally leave Iraq.

Any U.S. pullout hinges on how well Iraq’s police and army,
disbanded by U.S. authorities in 2003 and now being rapidly
rebuilt, can cope with the insurgency and sectarian violence.

The attacks on police stations on Tuesday and Wednesday
have dealt serious blows to the new security forces, raising
more questions about their effectiveness, particularly if Iraq
descends into all-out sectarian conflict.

Madaen, a mixed Sunni and Shi’ite town, is in a volatile
area where communal tensions run high and insurgent attacks on
Iraqi security forces are frequent.

Police in Baghdad also came under attack on Wednesday. Two
were killed when gunmen fired on their patrol in a western
area. A separate roadside bombing wounded two police commandos.

Police also found three bodies, their hands bound, with
gunshot wounds to the head in southern Baghdad.

Execution-style killings are a feature of the sectarian
violence in which hundreds of bodies, many showing signs of
torture, have been dumped in the streets in recent weeks.

(Additional reporting by Aseel Kami in Baghdad)