By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Iraq's Sunni vice president spoke out Sunday against the upcoming US-Iran talks on the situation in his country, saying the dialogue was "damaging to Iraq's sovereignty."
Iraq's Shi'ite and Kurdish-dominated government has been pressing for those talks, due to take place on May 28 in Baghdad to help appease spiraling violence in Iraq.
But the comments by Tariq al-Hashemi, a leader of the main Sunni bloc in parliament, reflected wide differences among the country's religious and ethnic groups on the role of Shi'ite-dominated Iran.
"It's not good to encourage anybody to talk on behalf of the Iraqi people on their internal and national affairs," al-Hashemi told reporters on the last day of an international conference held by the Geneva-based World Economic Forum.