Syria to help U.S., Iraq secure border

NEW YORK — Syria agreed yesterday to step up cooperation with the United States and Iraq along the Iraq-Syria border, a major entry point for terrorists and money headed for the Iraqi insurgency.

The agreement — raising prospects for a thaw in U.S.-Syrian relations — was reached during a meeting between Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shara at the United Nations.

“We discussed … their actions along the Syrian-Iraq border and the need for all of us to do more, and I think the Syrians are anxious to do more working with the coalition and especially, and more importantly, working with the Iraqi government,” Mr. Powell told reporters after the meeting.

“It’s a tough military mission and a tough political mission, but I sense a new attitude from the Syrians.” he said. “But, of course, it all depends on actions, not just attitudes, so we’ll be working closely with them.”

The secretary said he expected Iraq’s prime minister, Iyad Allawi, to visit Damascus in the near future to discuss Iraqi-Syrian cooperation.

“I hope that the Syrians now understand the need for all of us to do as much as we can in a tripartite manner — Syria, the Iraqi interim government and the coalition — to stop illicit, improper traffic across that border,” Mr. Powell said.

He also praised Syria’s plans to redeploy about 3,000 of its almost 20,000 troops in Lebanon from the outskirts of Beirut closer to the Syria-Lebanon border.

“We have noted a redeployment of some Syrian troops coming out of places where they haven’t come out of previously — camps south of Beirut — and so I think this is a positive step, and we took note of it,” he said.

Mr. Powell’s comments were the most positive that have been heard in years from the Bush administration on Syria, which remains on the State Department’s blacklist of state sponsors of terrorism.

The secretary had high hopes for a change of heart in Syria when he visited Damascus in May 2003, soon after Saddam Hussein’s overthrow, but his meeting with President Bashar Assad was a disappointment.

Since then, the Bush administration repeatedly has accused Mr. Assad’s government of sheltering militant groups and refusing to come clean about its programs for weapons of mass destruction.

Mr. Powell cited those two items yesterday when he said Washington still has “issues” to resolve with Syria, in spite of its new willingness to cooperate on Iraq.

He said at a joint press conference that he and Mr. Shara had “a good, open, candid” and “rather positive discussion.”

Mr. Shara declined to discuss the substance of the talks, saying only that the two had had “a good meeting.”

The two countries first formally broached the subject of military cooperation in Iraq 12 days ago, when a U.S. delegation led by William Burns, assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, met with Mr. Assad in Damascus.

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