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Iraqi president Talabani attends Colorado
conference
16.9.2006
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Aspen, Colorado,
USA , -- Iraqi President Jalal Talabani spent Friday
in this posh mountain resort as part of an annual
conference sponsored by a New York investment
company, The Associated Press has learned.
Talabani's participation was confirmed by a U.S.
State Department official who spoke on condition of
anonymity because he was not authorized to make
statements about the president's schedule. His
arrival was first reported by the Aspen Daily News
and KREX-TV in Grand Junction.
Talabani was expected to travel to New York this
weekend and then to Washington for a private meeting
with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice next week,
Assistant Secretary Kristen Silverberg said in
Washington.
Talabani arrived late Thursday so he could attend
the closed-door conference sponsored by Forstmann
Little Co., the Daily News said.
A spokeswoman at Forstmann Little said she could not
comment, though the upscale resort 100 miles west of
Denver often attracts political and corporate
leaders for conferences. |
Iraqi
President : Jalal Talabani, a Kurd
Photo: Military |
Talabani, a Kurd who once took up arms against
ousted dictator Saddam Hussein, was elected
president last year. Earlier this month, Talabani
said he expected fighting in Iraq to slow by the end
of 2007 and that Iraqi forces will be able to handle
any remaining violence.
Born in 1933 in the village of Kelkan, Talabani
attended law school and in 1975 founded the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. He led armed
resistance against Saddam until 1988, when the Iraqi
leader expelled Kurds from strategic areas in the
north and gassed Kurdish towns near the Iranian
border, killing tens of thousands of people.
After the 1991 Gulf War, Talabani and Kurdish
Democratic Party leader Massoud Barzani began
fighting over control of the north. A U.S.-sponsored
truce was signed in 1998 and the two formed a
Kurdish alliance.
Talabani's PUK also worked with the CIA in the
months before the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Forstmann Little and Co. is a leading investment
firm in New York run by sometime Aspen-area resident
Ted Forstmann, now the head of chief executive and
chairman of IMG, a media conglomerate best known for
representing star athletes and sports organizations.
AP
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