Blair will urge US to talk to Syria and Iran

The Guardian

Tony Blair is to urge the US administration next week to open talks with its great adversaries Syria and Iran, as a way to break the impasse in Iraq and the wider middle east.

He is due to give video link-up evidence to the independent bipartisan panel in Washington headed by James Baker, seen as the vehicle whereby George Bush can change course on Iraq. The evidence, on Tuesday, is regarded as a vital opportunity for the prime minister to influence thinking in Washington at a rare time of flux.

Mr Blair will not call for rapid withdrawal of coalition troops, but believes that Mr Bush is genuinely open to a change of strategy and tone following the US president's reverses in the midterm elections, a UK government official said.

British officials are not expecting the Baker panel, headed by the Republican former secretary of state but also made up of senior Democrats, to propose a volte face when it reports in a few months' time, but forecast it will call for measures to speed up the "Iraqi-isation" of the police and army. It will also propose greater political co-operation within Iraq.