Bush: Iraq violence is al-Qaida plot

[Ron Burgundy]

AP - President Bush said Tuesday that an al-Qaida plot to stoke cycles of sectarian revenge in Iraq is to blame for escalating bloodshed, refusing to debate whether the country has fallen into civil war.

"There's a lot of sectarian violence taking place -- fomented, in my opinion, because of the attacks by al-Qaida causing people to seek reprisal," Bush said at a news conference with Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves during a stop in Estonia.

He arrived later at the NATO summit in neighboring Latvia, where discussion will focus on the battle against insurgents in Afghanistan.

Bush, who travels to Jordan later in the week for a summit with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, said the latest surge of violence in Iraq does not represent a new era. "We've been in this phase for a while," he said.

Iraq is reeling from the deadliest week of sectarian fighting since the war began in March 2003.

Bush, dating the current spike in violence to a February bombing of a sacred Shiite shrine in Samarra that triggered reprisal attacks between Shiites and Sunnis and raised fears of civil war, said he will ask al-Maliki to explain his plan for quelling the violence.

"The Maliki government is going to have to deal with that violence and we want to help them do so," he said. "It's in our interest that we succeed."

Jordan's King Abdullah, who is hosting al-Maliki's meeting with Bush, has warned that unless bold steps are taken urgently, the new year could dawn with three civil wars in the Mideast -- with one in Iraq added to those in Lebanon and between the Palestinians and Israelis.

But Bush, dodging a direct answer of whether Iraq was embroiled in civil war, tied the three conflicts together in a different way: He said recent strife in Lebanon and the heated up Israeli-Palestinian dispute are, like Iraq, the result of extremists trying to choke democratic progress.

"When you see a young democracy beginning to emerge in the Middle East, the extremists try to defeat its emergence," Bush said. "Extremists attack because they can't stand the thought of a democracy. And the same thing is happening in Iraq."

Directly seeking help from Iran and Syria with Iraq, as part of new, aggressive diplomacy throughout the region, is expected to be among the recommendations of a bipartisan panel on Iraq.

Iran, the top U.S. rival in the region, has reached out to Iraq and Syria in recent days -- an attempt viewed as a bid to assert its role as a powerbroker in Iraq.

But Bush expressed reluctance to talk with two nations, which his administration regards as pariah states working to destabilize the Middle East. He added that the U.S. will only deal with Iran when they suspend their program of enriching uranium, which could be used in a nuclear weapon arsenal.

"The Iranians and the Syrians should help -- not destabilize -- this young democracy," he said.

Iran's state-run television, however, quoted Iraqi President Jalal Talabani as saying: "We are in dire need of Iran's help in establishing security and stability in Iraq." The comments came after Talabani met Monday with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran.

The New York Times quoted a senior U.S. intelligence official who said Iran-backed Hezbollah guerrillas had been providing training for the Mahdi Army, the Iraqi Shiite militia led by anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The anonymous official told the Times that 1,000 to 2,000 Shiite fighters had been trained in Lebanon by Hezbollah, also backed by Syria.

U.S. officials previously have accused Iran of military interference in Iraq.

Estonia, a former Soviet republic being rewarded as an anti-terror ally, was Bush's first stop en route to the NATO summit.

Bush said NATO "members must accept difficult assignments if we expect to be successful." The U.S., Britain and the Netherlands are doing much of the heavy lifting in the dangerous southern areas, but they want nations such as Germany, France, Italy and Spain operating in more secure northern areas to reduce restrictions on their forces to give NATO commanders more flexibility to use them.

Also of high concern in central and eastern European countries is their lack of participation in a U.S. visa waiver program. Ilves said it is something his country "constantly has been raising" with the U.S.

Bush promised to try to convince U.S. Congress to add more countries, including Estonia, to the program. "It's in our nation's interest that people be able to come and visit," he said.

Bush, the first sitting U.S. president to visit Estonia, also met with Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip, praising him for "your economic accomplishment and your contributions to peace and liberty around the world."

The U.S. president met also met with democracy rights activists and Estonian soldiers who have served on foreign missions before departing for Riga. Both Estonia and Latvia are strong U.S. allies, with forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

___

Associated Press writer Karl Ritter contributed to this report.



[Ron's editor note]
Original headline "Bush broadens diplomatic efforts on Iraq (AP)"
Original blurb "President Bush intensified diplomatic efforts on Monday to quell rising violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, turning to allies as his national security adviser said the conflict in Iraq had entered "a new phase" requiring changes."