Two US blackhawks crash in Baghdad

US and Iraqi officials are “very close” to an agreement on a controversial security pact that would decide the future of US forces in Iraq, US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte said here on Saturday.

“Negotiations are still on and there are very few issues still pending,” Negroponte told reporters in Arbil after meeting Massud Barzani, the president of the northern Kurdish administration of Iraq.

“We are very close to reaching an agreement. It’s not wise to reveal the details until we reach a final agreement, and we hope to reach a final agreement very soon,” said Negroponte, who arrived in Iraq on Friday on a previously unannounced visit.

Barzani said the deal should be signed as it “was in the interest of both the parties.”

Washington and Baghdad are trying to hammer out a deal that would lay the framework for the future of US forces in the violence-wracked country after 2008, when a UN mandate governing their presence expires.

But it has been delayed amid differences over certain key issues, mainly concerning the immunity granted to US soldiers in Iraq and who would lead the military operations from next year. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki last month said the two sides have, however, agreed to withdraw US forces from Iraqi cities by June 2009 and from the country by December 2011.

Two US Blackhawk helicop ters crashed in northern Baghdad’s Sunni district of Adhamiyah late on Saturday, a US military spokesman said. At least one Iraqi army soldier was killed and four people, including two US soldiers were wounded, spokesman Lieutenant Patrick Evans told AFP.

“Two UH-60 Blackhawks have crashed while landing at Combat Outpost Ford in Adhamiyah (northern Baghdad) about 8:55 p.m. (1755 GMT),” Evans said.

“One Iraqi army soldier is killed. Two coalition forces (personnel) and two Iraqi army (soldiers were) wounded,” he said, adding that the “situation is under control. Emergency services are on the scene.”

It is not known how many were on board at the time of the incident, he said.The helicopter crash came 17 days after another US military helicopter crashed in southern Iraq, killing all seven soldiers aboard.

The CH-47 Chinook crashed about 100 kilometres (60 miles) west of the main southern port city of Basra as it formed part of a four-aircraft convoy flying from Kuwait to the northern city of Balad.

Meanwhile, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit made a surprise visit to Iraq on Sunday, the first such trip since 1990, his office said. The one-day visit is aimed at restoring formal ties between the two countries, a foreign ministry official said in a statement.

Cairo has had no official diplomatic representative in Iraq since the July 2005 abduction and murder by Al-Qaeda of its charged’ affaires in Baghdad, Ihab al-Sharif.

Abul Gheit is being accompanied by Egypt’s Oil Minister Sameh Fahmi, the state-run news agency reported. The foreign minister said in May that Cairo was ready to send a fact-finding delegation to Baghdad to evaluate security conditions for opening an embassy.

“When we set up an embassy in Iraq we want to guarantee that conditions will be favourable and that its security will not be undermined,” he said at the time.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in April appealed to Sunni Arab states to help stabilise Iraq by living up to pledges to forgive his country’s debts, erasing war reparations and reopening embassies in Baghdad.