CAIRO, May 2 (UPI) -- The icy relations between the United States and Syria could warm up if the chief diplomats of the two countries meet this week in Egypt.
A high-level Egyptian diplomat told United Press International Wednesday that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is set to meet Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem on the sidelines of a conference on Iraq Thursday in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik. It would be the highest-level U.S.-Syrian engagement in years.
The diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the talks between the two would focus on controlling Syria's borders with Iraq, plagued by infiltrating Arab fighters, as well as the political crisis in Lebanon, where the pro-Syrian political forces refuse to endorse the international tribunal looking into the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Moallem said earlier this week he would meet Rice if such a meeting was requested.
Hosting Egyptian officials, however, would not say whether the chief U.S. diplomat would hold a similar meeting with her Iranian counterpart, who will also attend the Sharm el-Sheik conference that includes Iraq's neighbors.
U.S. President George W. Bush said Tuesday if Rice happened to bump into her Iranian counterpart, she would urge his country to stop enriching uranium.
Yet the official Iranian news agency reported Wednesday there will be no Iranian bilateral talks with Rice on the margins of the conference "so long as the United States doesn't change its hostile positions towards Iran."
