PM MALIKI REQUESTS UNSG BAN KI-MOON TO HOST

C O N F I D E N T I A L BAGHDAD 000629 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/20/2017 TAGS: ECON IZ OTRA PREL SUBJECT: PM MALIKI REQUESTS UNSG BAN KI-MOON TO HOST INTERNATIONAL COMPACT MEETING Classified By: Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, Reasons 1.4 (b,d) 1) On the evening of February 20, the Ambassador received a copy of Prime Minister Maliki's letter to the UN Secretary General, requesting that the United Nations host an International Compact Meeting. The Deputy Prime Minister's office reports that the letter has been transmited to New York via "normal diplomatic channels," but a copy was also furnished to SRSG Ashraf Qazi yesterday evening. The text of the letter is below. 2) Republic of Iraq Prime Minister's Office His Excellency Mr. Ban Ki-moon United Nations Secretary-General, We sincerely congratulate you on your becoming Secretary-General of the United Nations, wishing you every SIPDIS success in leading the United Nations to a place of greater strength and effectiveness to confront the challenges facing human kind. We would like to express to your Excellency that we are looking forward to start a new stage in Iraq's relations with the United Nations; the United Nations will contribute through those relations to play a greater role in supporting democracy and stability, confronting violence and terrorism, and in the efforts of construction and building. We would like to express to your Excellency our sincere thanks and appreciation for your supportive stands on the International Compact with Iraq at your first press conference of December 11, 2007. The Iraqi Government earnestly looks forward to continued progress towards the International Compact with the participation of the United Nations and the International community. For the sake of achieving this goal, we consider it would be useful to have the United Nations host a meeting that would bring together the International community around the Compact in New York, to complete the fruitful meetings that were held before and were hosted by the United Nations in New York during the months of September and November 2006, in addition to the successful meetings that the preparatory committee had in Abu Dhabi and Kuwait. In our view, the purpose of having this meeting is to give Iraq and the United Nations an opportunity to reaffirm their commitment to the International Compact. The meeting will be an opportunity for Iraq to present the latest developments and any recent progress happening in the political and security areas to the International community, in addition to recognizing the economic reforms which are considered - as you know - the substantive matter of the Compact. Since this is considered an emergency meeting to present the latest information, we hope many of the United Nations countries will attend through their permanent representatives, and we invite the countries that have in fact supported this Compact in their capacity as members in the preparatory committee, to send their senior people. We are looking to hold this meeting at the end of the month of February or the beginning of March 2007, and we would be happy to discuss the convenient schedule for that. Deputy Prime Minister Dr. Barham Salih, will continue to work in this matter in his capacity as the one delegated by the Government of Iraq to assume responsibility for this subject. I have asked him to follow up the matter with the United Nations since it is such an important priority. Sincerely, Nouri Kamel Al Maliki Baghdad, February 20, 2007 KHALILZAD