Iraq Ready To Help France In Hostage Crisis: F.M.

AMMAN, Sept 6 (AFP) - Iraq's US-backed interim government is ready to help France secure the release of two of its journalists abducted by Islamic militants, Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Monday in his first public reaction to the crisis.
"The Iraqi government is willing and ready to provide the French government with everything possible to help it free the hostages and return them safely to their families and their homes," Zebari told a news conference in the Jordanian capital.
Zebari said he had received a French foreign ministry delegation in Baghdad. "I expressed to them, on behalf of the Iraqi government, our readiness to give them all possible support and information."
The Iraqi foreign minister, who is visiting Amman as part of an Arab tour, said Baghdad "did not declare publicly any positions concerning the French hostages for one reason.
"We did not want to interfere in a very delicate subject while negotiations were under way between the French government and the kidnappers or other parties.
"We found it suitable that the government and the Iraqi officials should not interfere so that the negotiations would not become complicated."
Zebari said President Ghazi al-Yawar had postponed a planned visit to France this week for the same reason -- "so that it will not pose a conflict with the hostage issue which became a popular cause in France".
Zebari said he had discussed the French hostage crisis with his Jordanian counterpart Marwan Moasher and assured him of Baghdad's "readiness" to do everything in its power to help.
But he stressed that his government was not prepared to let up in its battle with the militants.
There had been suggestions that a major security force operation last week against the Sunni Muslim insurgent bastion of Latifiya, near where newsmen Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot went missing on August 20, might have complicated efforts for their release.
"The military operations against the groups who threaten the lives of the Iraqi people every day ... will continue," said Zebari.