Iran's Ahmadinejad to visit Baghdad

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will make the first trip by an Iranian leader to Iraq next month.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will make the first trip by an Iranian leader to Iraq next month.

Mr Ahmadinejad will meet Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and President Jalal Talabani during his two-day visit. The two countries will discuss bilateral relations and joint projects, a government spokesman said.

The neighbouring countries fought an eight-year war in the 1980s that left an estimated million people killed or wounded. But relations have improved since the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein's regime.

Iran is overwhelmingly Shia Muslim, and Iraq has a roughly 60 per cent Shia majority that emerged from decades of marginalisation to become the country's dominant force.

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The announcement of the visit on March 2nd comes as Iran has postponed the next session of expert-level talks on security with US diplomats, which had been due tomorrow.

The talks would have been the fourth in a series that is designed to deal with Iraqi security. Iraqi officials serve as the go-between in arranging the talks and sit in on the discussions.

The United States has accused Iran of training and supplying Shia militia fighters with weapons and explosives in Iraq.

AP