MOSCOW, 8 April 2003 — US President George W. Bush’s top national security aide met Russian officials yesterday in a lightning visit to Moscow to try to repair relations badly shaken by the war on Iraq.
With Moscow smarting over an armed attack on a Russian diplomatic convoy in Iraq — so far unexplained — US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice held talks with Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and other senior officials.
Russian media quoted Rice as saying as she left the talks that they had been “very good” but neither she nor her Russian hosts made any other public statement. There was no indication of how much Sunday’s incident had figured in discussions.
Gunfire raked the convoy of Russian diplomats and journalists as it left Baghdad. An embassy driver was wounded in the side and needed surgery and four diplomats, including the ambassador Vladimir Titorenko, were slightly hurt. The convoy traveled on to Syria yesterday, though the wounded driver and one other member of the embassy staff stayed behind in an Iraqi hospital.
“We have been through some difficult times and differences over Iraq have strained the relationship and we look forward to exchanging views on how to move forward,” a US Embassy spokesman said as Rice began the talks with Ivanov.
Apart from Foreign Minister Ivanov, Rice also met Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov and other officials in the Kremlin.
Russia sought to dissuade the United States and Britain from going to war to topple Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, arguing for a diplomatic solution to the crisis over banned weapons.
President Vladimir Putin, with an eye to ties with Washington and future economic interests in Iraq, has softened this criticism and says a US military defeat would not be in Russia’s interests.
Though Moscow admonished Washington over US air attacks on Baghdad last week which it said struck uncomfortably close to the Russian Embassy there, Putin has since told Bush he wants to maintain “an intense political dialogue” with Washington.
He told Russia’s parliament to set aside differences with Washington on Iraq and ratify a landmark treaty on slashing numbers of deployed nuclear warheads.
Though it was not clear which who was responsible for the attack on the Russian convoy, the issue seemed likely to have injected some emotion into Rice’s meetings.
The US Army said it had no troops in the Baghdad suburb where the incident took place, but a Russian television correspondent in the convoy said it had been caught in crossfire between US and Iraqi forces.
A ministry statement on Sunday said US Secretary of State Colin Powell had called Ivanov to express his “deep regret” at the incident. From the Russian Foreign Ministry version of the telephone call, this appeared to stop short of an admission of any US responsibility.
