Negroponte, Ninewa governor discuss Iraq political developments

NINEWA / IraqiNews.com: Ninewa Governor Dreid Kashmoula received on Monday U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte and took up together the political scene in Iraq in general and Ninewa in particular. “I met today with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Negroponte and his accompanying delegation during their short two hours’ visit at the U.S. base headquarters in Mosul to discuss current political developments in Iraq,” Kashmoula said in statements to IraqiNews.com. The U.S. embassy in Baghdad had said Negroponte arrived on Friday evening in Iraq on an unannounced visit during which he met with President Jalal Talabani, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Iraqi Kurdistan Region President Massoud Barazani. Kashmoula quoted the U.S. delegation as expressing readiness to help the Iraqi people overcome their ordeal and solve political problems. The meeting was attended by the Ninewa provincial council chief, Hisham al-Hamadani, his deputy, Khisro Kouran, and the Ninewa Operations Command (NOC) chief General Riad Jalal Tawfiq. Mosul, the capital city of Ninewa, lies 405 km north of Baghdad. The original city of Mosul stands on the west bank of the Tigris River, opposite the ancient biblical city of Nineveh on the east bank, but the metropolitan area has now grown to encompass substantial areas on both banks, with five bridges linking the two sides. Despite having an amount of Kurdish population, it does not form part of the area controlled by the Kurdistan Regional Government Kurdistan RegionG). There are different communities in Mosul like Christians, Shiites and Kurds along with a Sunni majority. The city is also a historic center for the Nestorian Christianity of the Assyrians, containing the tombs of several Old Testament prophets such as Jonah, Yunus in Arabic, and Nahum. AmR (S) 1