BAGHDAD (AFP) — US Vice President Dick Cheney declared Washington's "unwavering" support for Iraq during a surprise visit to Baghdad on Monday just days before the war enters its sixth year.
A series of bomb blasts greeted Cheney's high-security and secrecy-shrouded arrival, underscoring the deadly violence that still grips the nation five years after US bombs began dropping on Baghdad.
Cheney, on a visit aimed at highlighting security gains and promoting political progress, said he had been sent by President George W. Bush to thank Iraqi leaders for their efforts in steering the country towards democracy.
He was in Baghdad, he added, to "reaffirm to the Iraqi people the unwavering commitment of the United States to support them in finishing the difficult work that lies ahead."
"It's especially significant I think to be able to return this week as we mark the fifth anniversary of the beginning of the campaign that liberated the people of Iraq from Saddam Hussein's tyranny and launched them on the difficult but historic road to democracy," Cheney said after meeting Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.
He also held talks with the top US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and US ambassador Ryan Crocker and was due to meet other senior Iraqi political figures, including President Jalal Talabani.
Soon after his arrival, three explosions rocked Baghdad, including a car bombing in the central neighbourhood of Karada that killed three people.
A security official said one of the other blasts was caused by a mortar attack on the highly-fortified Green Zone, home of the US embassy and the seat of Iraqi government, while a road bomb killed a policeman.
In a separate mission, US Republican presidential hopeful John McCain was meeting Iraqi leaders and US military officials to assess the success of the "surge" strategy that deployed more soldiers to Iraq, his aides said.
Cheney's visit is the first stop on a nine-day tour of the Middle East and beyond, with scheduled landings in Oman, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the West Bank, and Turkey.
A senior administration official told reporters accompanying Cheney that the vice president would tell the Iraqis "they need to continue to show some progress" on legislation seen as key to defusing sectarian strife.
The laws include an oil-revenue sharing measure; a law setting out provincial government powers; and one covering elections that the US official said were expected to take place October 1.
The official, who asked not to be named, said negotiations to forge an agreement governing long-term US-Iraq ties would be part of the talks.
The framework needs to be in place by year's end when the UN mandate for the US-led occupation ends, but "that conversation is really just beginning," the official said.
Cheney's talks with Crocker and Petraeus came as they prepared to make a progress report on the unpopular war to the US Congress on April 8-9, which is expected to shape debate on withdrawal of the some 158,000 US troops.
Bush's Republicans worry that the war could cost them the November 4 elections, which will decide control of Congress and who takes the keys of the White House in January 2009.
The conflict has claimed nearly 4,000 US lives and tens and possibly thousands of Iraqi lives and cost -- by the Pentagon's conservative estimate -- upwards of 400 billion dollars.
Cheney made a similar trip in May 2007, months after Bush ordered some 30,000 more US soldiers to the strife-torn country to give what aides called "breathing space" to the government in Baghdad to enact difficult legislation aimed at fostering national reconciliation.
But Petraeus told the Washington Post last week that "no one" in the US and Iraqi governments "feels that there has been sufficient progress by any means in the area of national reconciliation," or in providing basic public services.
Democratic senator and chairman of the US Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, who is accompanying McCain, said Iraqi leaders had "failed" to take advantage of the reduced violence following the surge.
"As I say time and again our support is not open-ended and Iraq's politicians will have to work together to resolve their differences," he told AFP during a tour of the restive province of Diyala.
Beyond Iraq, the vice president's mission aimed to help revive the battered Middle East peace process and convince Arab allies like Saudi Arabia to do more to help curb regional powerhouse Iran's influence in Iraq.
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