U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will attend an international conference on Iraq in Stockholm, Sweden, President George W. Bush said Thursday.
Speaking to reporters, Bush said that "Iraq will increase its engagement with the world and the world must increase its engagement with Iraq."
"I'm directing our nation's senior diplomats to meet with the leaders in Jordan, the UAE, and Qatar, and Kuwait and Egypt. In each capital they will brief them on the situation in Iraq and encourage these nations to open their embassies in Baghdad and increase their overall support for Iraq," Bush said.
"This will be followed by Secretary Rice's trip to the third expanded neighbors' conference in Kuwait City, and the second international 'Compact with Iraq' meeting in Stockholm," he said.
Rice is to visit Bahrain on April 21 to meet the foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan and the Gulf Cooperation Council -- Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman.
Following her visit to Bahrain, Rice will attend an international conference in Kuwait on April 22 to promote Iraq's security that involves Iran and other neighbors, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Wednesday.
Rice has taken 14 trips to the Middle East in the past 15 months for talks on Palestinian-Israel peace and Iraq war.
Sweden hosts the 2nd international conference on Iraq on May 29in collaboration with Iraq's government and the United Nations. It will be the first follow-up meeting after the launch of the five-year International Compact with Iraq peace and development plan in Egypt last May.
Source:Xinhua
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