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Britain's Straw to visit Iran

President Khatami
Straw is expecterd to meet Iranian President Mohammad Khatami  


LONDON, England -- British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw is to visit Iran, the first visit to Tehran by a British foreign minister since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

Straw told reporters his visit to Tehran would be during his September 25-27 tour of the Middle East, during which he will discuss the international response to world terrorism.

The announcement came hours after Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair held an unprecedented satellite telephone conversation with Iranian President Mohammed Khatami.

Straw's trip to Tehran, where he will meet senior ministers and possibly the Iranian president, will be the first leg of a whistle-stop Middle East tour, which will take in Jordan, the Palestine authority, and Israel.

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Announcing the visit during a news conference at the Foreign Office on Friday, Straw also dismissed the response of Afghanistan's Taliban rulers to U.S. demands to hand over Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden.

He said Afghanistan's instruction to bin Laden to leave Afghanistan voluntarily. was a "puny and totally unacceptable" response.

Straw told reporters that Iran had been strident in its opposition to the Taliban regime and vocal in its condemnation of last week's attacks on New York and Washington.

He said that Anglo-Iranian relations had been improving steadily in recent years.

Straw said that he had arranged provisionally to visit Tehran later this year, but following a conversation he had with the Iranian Foreign Minister on Sunday and the conversation between Blair and the Iranian president on Thursday the decision had been taken to bring the visit forward.

On the possibility of military action against Afghanistan, Straw stressed that the Allies' argument was with the Taliban leadership rather than the Afghan people.

He said any action would be "not against the people of Afghanistan who have suffered grievously from the extremism of the Taliban, and our hearts go out to them. The argument has to be with the government of Afghanistan."

He added that although its response was unacceptable, the Taliban clearly wanted to rid their country of the Saudi dissident.

The Taliban leadership were now aware just what a liability he had become, Straw said, and also accepted his "complicity and culpability in terrorism."

Straw said he had no doubts about bin Laden's responsibility for last week's attacks.

He said: "The United States, ourselves, the other allies are satisfied that Osama bin Laden and his organisation were behind these terrorist attacks."

But he stressed that although bin Laden was the leader of the organisation, the network was an extensive one.

"What is essential is that the effort by the allies deals with all this terrorism, not just the leader", he said.

Tehran Radio said the Blair-Khatami conversation took place on Thursday when Blair phoned the Iranian president to praise Iran's important role in fighting terrorism.

The pair spoke by satellite phone as Blair made a trans-Atlantic flight to the United States.

As well as discussing terrorism, state-run Tehran Radio also reported that Khatami told Blair that Iran was concerned about any hasty plans the developing U.S.-led anti-terrorism coalition might have to attack Afghanistan.

The call was the first high-level direct contact between Iran and a major Western power in many years.





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