U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Saudi Arabia's ambassador Adel Al-Jubeir after Saudi King Abdullah strongly criticized the U.S. military presence in Iraq, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said on Friday.

Rice had a "good chat" with the Saudi envoy and their conversation would be followed up by other senior U.S. officials, McCormack said, declining to provide further details.

Meanwhile, McCormack insisted that the United States has good, sound relations with Saudi Arabia.

"We have fundamentally good, sound relations with the Saudi government and with King Abdullah in particular. We all fundamentally share the same goal of a united, whole Iraq as a place for all Iraqis. The Saudi government wants to see a stable Iraq. We all share that goal," he said.

The United States has said it will seek clarification over comments by Saudi King Abdullah that the American occupation of Iraq was illegal.

"Obviously, we will seek clarification. You never know. It could have been interpretation. It could have been misreported," U. S. Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns said Thursday while testifying at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

King Abdullah told Arab leaders on Wednesday that the American occupation of Iraq was illegal and warned that unless Arab governments settled their differences, foreign powers like the United States would continue to dictate the region's politics.

The king's speech, made at the opening of the Arab League's meeting in Riyadh, underscored growing differences between Saudi Arabia and the Bush administration as the Saudis take on a greater leadership role in the Middle East, the New York Times said in a report on Thursday.

Source: Xinhua