Iranian Leader, in Baghdad, Hails 'New Chapter' in Ties with Iraq

Iraq's Shiite majority and the Kurdish minority, both brutally suppressed under Hussein, are also divided internally over Iran's rising influence. But to Iraq's president, Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, the welcome accorded Ahmadinejad was an Iraqi expression of gratitude toward an Iranian government that also opposed Hussein.

Talabani and his fellow Kurds once fought alongside Iranian troops against Hussein, who used poison gas against the Kurdish population of northern Iraq. Top Shiite leaders such as Abdul Aziz al-Hakim spent years in exile in Tehran.

"By this historical visit of our brother Dr. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, we have first renewed the feelings of mutual struggle and jihad, which goes back a long time ago against the dictatorship," Talabani told reporters.

"A visit to Iraq without the dictator is a truly happy one," said Ahmadinejad, dressed in his trademark gray suit with white shirt and no tie.

The pomp and ceremony, in public and on television, sharply contrasted with the surprise visits to Iraq by President Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair.

Iraq and Iran are expected to sign as many as 10 economic agreements before Ahmadinejad leaves on Monday, including ones involving electricity and oil projects. Among the items to be discussed is the status of the Shatt al Arab, a waterway where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers meet and which divides Iran and Iraq.

"The Iranian role in Iraq, this role is seen by the majority of the people as being a positive one," said Abbas Bayati, a Shiite legislator close to Maliki.

Senior Iraqi politicians said they would also use the visit as an opportunity to address concerns. Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd, said the Iraqi government has repeatedly complained to Tehran of Iran's alleged support and training of armed groups inside Iraq.

That message would be conveyed again to Ahmadinejad, he said. But he added that Iran in recent months has helped rein in militias, especially the Mahdi Army of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. Sadr's movement has long denied any ties to Iran.

"We hope to engage, not to frighten them about our long-term relationship with the United States," Zebari said. "We will reassure them that Iraq will not be a launching pad for the United States to make attacks on Iran."

In interviews last week, U.S. military officials accused Iran of fueling violence inside Iraq, including targeting U.S. forces with rockets and roadside bombs.

Citing accounts from Iraqis in U.S. military custody, U.S. officials said Iranian operatives were training Iraqis as fighters and as trainers themselves, in camps inside Iran. The officials said U.S. forces had detained as many as a dozen Iraqis who trained in those camps last September through November.