Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro
de la Prensa-Basln Ozeti
January 2, 2001
Iraqi official seeks expansion of trade relations with Iran
Kermanshah, Kermanshah Prov., Jan 2, !RNA -- Iraqi Deputy Trade Minister Fakhri Rishan arrived in Iran overland
here Tuesday via Khosravi border post in western Iran, saying Iran and Iraq have capacities to expand their
economic cooperation.
"I will discuss expansion of trade relations with Iranian officials," he told !RNA after entering Iran for a five-day
visit. He said that the two neighbors, Iran and Iraq, have good opportunities to expand their trade relations.
Rishan, heading a high-ranking delegation, said that Khosravi border market is very important for Iran and Iraq.
He expressed hope he would hold fruitful talks with Iranian officials.
Iran and Iraq are making efforts to expand their relations in all ields after they fought the the 1980-1988 bloody
war which claimed heavy casualties on both sides.
Major stumbling blocks for an improvement in ties between the two neighbors are their support for each other's
opposition groups and the release of prisoners of war from the 1980-1988 conflict, which ended without a formal
peace treaty.
In early December, Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi told visiting Iraqi undersecretary for foreign affairs Riad
al-Qaissi that Tehran and Baghdad needed to respect the 1975-Algiers agreement that fixed the two countries' borders.
The 1975 agreement was signed between the shah of Iran and Saddam Hussein, who was vice-president at the
time.
The accord ended Iranian support for Kurdish rebels in Iraq in return for a sharing of the Shatt al-Arab waterway,
known to Iranians as the Arvand Roud, which forms part of the two states' border and runs into the Persian Gulf.
In early November, Iran's Minister of Roads and Transportation paid a three-day visit to Iraq. Hojjati held talks
with his Iraqi First Vice-President Taha Yassin Ramadan on sea and land transportation, linking Central Asia to the
eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea.
Hojjati had crossed overland from the border and therefore had not broken the international air embargo on Baghdad
that has been increasingly flouted in recent weeks by certain nations which call for an end to sanctions on Iraq.
Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi disregarded the embargo when he flew into Iraq earlier this month for talks
on resolving issues between the two nations left over from their 1980-1988 war. It was the first visit to Baghdad by
an Iranian foreign minister in a decade.
Iran is still keeping its airspace closed to Iraqi planes in line with the 10-year-old UN air embargo
suggestions
to the contrary.
despite sporadic
January 3, 2001
* * * * *
Iraq Says Reports of Saddam Illness Are Absurd
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq Wednesday dismissed reports that President Saddam
over the weekend.
Hussein
had suffered a stroke
,.
Some media outlets in England and Germany have run reports based on claims from the exiled Iraqi opposition
that Saddam is in intensive care after the stroke. 'These reports are so silly that they do not even deserve a reply,"
said Salam Khatab al-Nassiri, director-general of the Information Department of the Ministry of Culture and
Information.
"All the world has seen how President Saddam Hussein stood for more than five hours greeting units of our brave
army at the AI-Aqsa Call Parade," Nassiri said in a statement. "He also fired more than 140 shots one handed,
something most young people are unable to do - this alone is enough as a reply to this absurd news," he added.
Saddam presided Sunday over what appeared to be the biggest military parade in Baghdad since the 1991 Gulf
War, greeting army units with shots from a rifle he held in one hand.
The four-hour parade displayed sophisticated surface-to-surface and anti-aircraft missiles, artillery and over 1,000
modem, Russian-made tanks as well as infantry units. Formations of jet fighters and helicopter gunships flew
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