¡¡¡¡BAGHDAD, July 18 (Xinhuanet) -- Iraq on Thursday protested to the United Nations against the United States for refusing to grant visas to an Iraqi delegation that was supposed to take part in the preparatory meeting of the International Criminal Court in New Yorkon July 1, the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) reported.

¡¡¡¡"The US refusal to issue visas to Iraqi delegation members has prevented them from playing their role in the meetings sponsored bythe United Nations," Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri Ahmed said in a letter to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Thursday.

¡¡¡¡Ahmed urged Annan to intervene and demand the United States "to respect its obligations and commitments to the United Nations" and stop from placing obstacles and preventing Iraqi delegations to attend UN meetings in the future, the INA said.

¡¡¡¡Iraq has no foreign relations with the United States and the twocountries have been sworn enemies since the 1991 Gulf War, during which the US-led multinational coalition army defeated Iraq and evicted Iraqi troops out of Kuwait after a seven-month occupation.

¡¡¡¡The Iraqi foreign minister has complained that the United Statesdelayed to grant visas for his delegation members to engage in talks with the United Nations in New York.

¡¡¡¡Consequently, Iraq requested to have talks with the UN chief in Vienna instead of New York, where the first two rounds of talks between Iraq and the United Nations in March and May were held. Thethird round of talks between the two sides were held in the Austrian capital of Vienna early this month. Enditem

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