UAE Appoints Ambassador To Iraq

by George
(Chicago)

The United Arab Emirates is appointing an ambassador to Iraq. They are the first country to do so since Saddam Hussein was overthrown in 2003. The Bush administration wants other Arab countries to do the same.

Ryan Crocker, the United States ambassador to Baghdad was in Washington on June 5, 2008 and hopes that Saudi Arabia will soon do the same. "This reflects I think an appreciation on the part of the Arabs that things are different in Iraq in both security and political terms. Now the challenge is keeping all this going."

In an article on Yahoo News from AFP in Washington, spokeswoman Dana Perino said the White House is excited about this.

The United States sees fostering formal diplomatic and economic ties -- a central goal of US Vice President Dick Cheney's March trip to the region -- as critical to moderate Iranian influence in Iraq.

The UAE move shows that Iraq has improved and it raises prospects that the country and its neighbors are "hopefully getting back on a path to normal and good relations with its neighbors in the region," said Perino.

"It's very exciting for Iraq to be able to be recognized in this way," she told reporters.