INDIA: Senior American officials are trying to persuade a number of Muslim states to send troops to Iraq as the June 30th deadline for sovereignty handover approaches.
US Defence Secretary Mr Donald Rumsfeld is visiting Bangladesh at the weekend where he is expected to urge the predominantly Muslim nation to contribute troops to the Washington-led military coalition in Iraq, reports from the capital Dhaka said.
Mr Rumsfeld is likely to meet Bangladesh's Prime Minister Ms Khaleda Zia and her foreign minister Mr M. Morshed Khan during his Dhaka visit where the deployment of Bangladeshi troops to Iraq may feature.
Financial incentives to one of the world's poorest nations might be forthcoming, official sources indicated. Nearly 800 US troops have died in the Iraqi insurgency that erupted after the US-led war against Saddam Hussein that President Bush declared at an end over a year ago. Washington is now under increasing pressure to withdraw its troops.
The US earned further opprobrium and worldwide embarrassment following the revelations of abuse of Iraqi prisoners. The US is desperately seeing peacekeeping forces from countries like Bangladesh, Pakistan and neighbouring India to replace its demoralized force. Around 35,000 of the US troops are reservists, with the majority clamouring through their congressmen, to return home. All three South Asian states have large standing armies with decades of experience in UN peacekeeping missions. Over the past year all three have consistently declared they would deploy troops to Iraq only if the request came from the UN.