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Iraqi interior minister arrives in Tehran for security talks

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

Tehran, April 3, IRNA -- Iraqi Interior Minister Nuri Badran arrived 
here Saturday night for a four-day visit to discuss border security 
issues between the two neighbors as well as dispatch of Iranian 
pilgrims to holy sites in Iraq. 
The Iraqi interim minister, heading a political and security 
delegation, was received at Mehrabad airport, before heading for 
talks with the country`s officials, including Iranian Interior 
Minister Abdolvahed Mousavi Lari. 
The border security issue between Tehran and Baghdad have found 
added prominence following the collapse of former Iraqi dictator 
Saddam Hussein, who imposed a destructive war on the two neighbors 
between 1980 and 1988. 
Iran has about 1,500 kilometers of common borders with Iraq, which
Tehran announced as closed following deadly bombings in Baghdad and 
Karbala in early March, in which 171 people were killed. 
Senior Iraqi clerics, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, 
blamed the occupying forces, headed by the US, for security lapses. 
US officials, however, accused Tehran of doing not enough to 
prevent insurgents from allegedly crossing into Iraq from Iran. 
Iran turned the tables on the United States, saying the US-led 
occupation forces` failure to properly police Iraq`s borders was to 
blame for security lapses in the war-torn country. 
Iran is also trying to regularize dispatch of pilgrims to Shi`ite 
sites in Iraq in the face of widespread illegal trips. 
An informed Iraqi police source told IRNA on Saturday that 15 
Iranian pilgrims were being held in police custody in the holy city 
of Karbala on charge of illegal entry. 
The source, who asked not to be named, said that most of the 
detainees were men, who had been picked up by the Iraqi police since 
last week after illegally entering the country ahead of the major 
mourning occasion of Arbain. 
The arrests came following a series of coordinated attacks which 
turned a similar commemoration into carnage in early March. 
The occasion is expected to attract millions of Muslims to the 
holy city, giving Iraqi police enough reason to worry amid worsening 
security situation in the war-torn country. 
According to the informed police source, efforts were underway to 
release the Iranian detainees in the next few days and repatriate 
them, given that their intentions were merely pilgrimage. 
Iran, which has a dominant Shi`ite Muslim population, took action 
following the Ashura bombings and closed all its border crossing 
points with Iraq, except for Manzariyah, Zorbatiyah and Shalamchah. 
BH/214 
End