'Sources': Britain holding secret talks with "all the main insurgent groups" except al-Qaeda

The coffin of Britain's Private Eleanor Dlugosz is carried by friends and colleagues at a ceremony at Basra Air Station in April. A personal friend of Prince Harry, Dlugosz was one of four British troops killed by a roadside bomb.

Britain is holding secret talks with leading insurgents in Iraq with the aim of dividing them from Al-Qaeda in a new drive to curb sectarian violence.

Dominic Asquith, the British ambassador to Baghdad, is said to have been coordinating the talks over recent months, along with other British representatives believed to be from MI6.

Details of the initiative, which followed the failure of similar talks between insurgents and American officials, emerged yesterday as Tony Blair visited Iraq.

Middle Eastern sources said extensive talks between insurgents and British officials were under way. Some had taken place in private houses in the Kurdish north of Iraq, others outside the country, they said.

“Apart from Al-Qaeda, all the main insurgent groups took part,” claimed a Kurdish source close to the discussions.

Read the rest at the Times of London

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