(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-03-17 08:13

ARAB ANCHOR

The United States wants Saudi Arabia, and other Arab allies like Egypt, to set up a diplomatic presence in Iraq by appointing an ambassador and opening an embassy in Baghdad.

"The United States can do a lot for Iraq, but we cannot provide Iraq with an anchor in the Arab world, a kind of legitimacy for the new Iraqi project that comes from being fully integrated in its neighborhood," the US official said.

"And I think clearly some of our friends in the Arab world can do more on that score," he said on condition of anonymity.

But analysts were skeptical that Cheney would make any major breakthroughs.

"I don't think that he's going to be able to bring back anything meaningful because he's got nothing to offer," Steven Simon, a senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, said.

"He represents a lame duck president, a floundering economy, a situation in which the US for all its efforts in Iraq has no leverage on the government in Baghdad," Simon said.

Cheney throughout his trip will discuss the situation in Iraq, where security has improved, but violence persists five years after the US-led invasion.

Bush will soon receive a new assessment from Gen. David Petraeus, the top US commander in Iraq, and US Ambassador Ryan Crocker, that he will weigh in deciding whether any changes to US strategy are needed.

Cheney will tell allies that the United States remains concerned about Iran's nuclear ambitions and would like to see its growing regional influence contained.

"I expect in all of these countries that the challenge we face from Iran will be a very high topic of conversation," the US administration official said.

The message for Turkey, which has been fighting Kurdish rebels known as the PKK in northern Iraq, will be that the United States agrees "the PKK is a terrorist organization that needs to be defeated," and will continue to support Turkey in addressing the problem, the official said.

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