Chalabi Ready For U.S. Visit, Another Shot At Limelight

BAGHDAD, Nov. 5 -- Ten months ago, after Ahmed Chalabi had been accused of misleading the United States into war and his longtime American patrons began investigating him for espionage, aides to the controversial Iraqi politician lamented that Washington's stance on looming parliamentary elections seemed as simple as ABC: Anybody But Chalabi.

With a new round of elections slated for Dec. 15, Chalabi is making his first official visit to Washington in two years for cabinet-level meetings -- with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Wednesday and Treasury Secretary John W. Snow in the following days. Chalabi and some U.S. officials say those talks signal a fresh start, for now.

"If I visit Washington, it means there is no ice wall between us," Chalabi, Iraq's deputy prime minister, told reporters this past week.

"Think of him as a former football player -- that was all then. That's what he did in his other life," said a senior Bush administration official who has dealt with Chalabi. He spoke on condition of anonymity because Chalabi remains a divisive figure within the administration.

A Western diplomat in Baghdad was more circumspect. "I wouldn't read more or less into it than that we have important issues to discuss with the man and we are going to discuss them," he said, briefing reporters on the condition that he not be named.

In apparently synchronized language, several U.S. officials described Chalabi's visit as routine, one of several by Iraqi politicians this year. A State Department official said Chalabi's reception would feature "no favors, but no snubs."

Chalabi's return to Washington's corridors of power comes amid speculation in the United States and in Iraq that, despite his damaged reputation, he remains a top contender to become Iraq's next prime minister.

With his cherubic face and Cheshire cat grin, Chalabi became the most famous and influential figure in a group of Iraqi exiles during Saddam Hussein's rule and spent a decade working to topple the dictator through the Iraqi National Congress, a U.S.-funded opposition group he helped found. The MIT-trained former banker and businessman is described by admirers and critics alike as perhaps his country's most gifted political operator. But he is also often derided as a man too often tied to scandal.

After the 2003 invasion, much of the information the Iraqi National Congress provided to the U.S. government about Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction proved inaccurate, administration officials said. Last summer, U.S. forces raided Chalabi's Baghdad office after he was accused of sending secrets to Iran, whose government he retains close ties with. Chalabi has denied those allegations and has not been formally charged. On Saturday, Chalabi traveled to Tehran, where he met with top Iranian officials to discuss bilateral relations, according to Iran's official news agency.

The fallout from last year's raid led him to lower his public profile for much of the past year, minimizing media coverage and focusing on an essential, if uncelebrated, job of coordinating the Iraqi government's energy policy and protecting its oil infrastructure.

But Chalabi has remained a political power broker. He worked to bring radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr -- whose Mahdi Army militia clashed with U.S. forces last summer and fall -- to the negotiating table and eventually to embrace politics over violence.

He made headlines again this summer, and drew criticism, when reports surfaced that a commission he chairs -- charged with ridding the Iraqi government of former high-level members of Hussein's Baath Party -- attempted to remove some of the judges on the special tribunal that will hear the former dictator's cases. He also played a leading role in framing Iraq's draft constitution, which passed a nationwide referendum on Oct. 15.