Baghdad- Iraq has told Iran that its security pact with the United States would not threaten Iran's national sovereignty, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said on Tuesday.

"The security agreement has no articles that threaten the security of neighbouring countries," Zebari said in a statement following his meeting with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Kazemi.

"Iraq will not be used as a base for attacks on neighbouring countries," Zebari added.

Baghdad - Iraq has told Iran that its security pact with the United States would not threaten Iran's national sovereignty, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said on Tuesday.

"The security agreement has no articles that threaten the security of neighbouring countries," Zebari said in a statement following his meeting with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Kazemi.

"Iraq will not be used as a base for attacks on neighbouring countries," Zebari added.

Baghdad - Iraq has told Iran that its security pact with the US would not threaten Iran's national sovereignty, Iraq's foreign minister said on Tuesday.

"The security agreement has no articles that threaten the security of neighbouring countries," Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said in a statement following his meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Hassan Kazemi, according to a ministry statement.

"Iraq will not be used as a base for attacks on neighbouring countries," Zebari added.

Zebari and US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker signed the Status of Forces Agreement in Baghdad on Monday.

Washington, Nov 18: Commenting on the recent troops-withdrawal pact between the Iraqi cabinet and the US, American top military officer Admiral Michael Mullen has said that the timing of that withdrawal should be based on “security conditions on the ground”.

Though, he added that the US military would require two to three years to remove its roughly 150,000 troops and “awful lot” of equipment from Iraq safely.

He said there were some logistical hurdles to a US troop withdrawal along a fixed timeframe.

Baghdad  - One of the few positive stories coming out of war- torn Iraq in recent years has been the success of their national football teams.

Since 2003, when the country sent an under-23 team to the Asian Cup and managed to qualify for the quarter-finals, Iraqi teams have been grabbing their fair share of international headlines.

In 2004, the international media followed their Cinderella story at the Olympic Games in Athens as the same under-23 team reached the semi-finals of the Olympic football tournament and finished fourth.

But if Iraqi fans thought it could get no better, they were in for a pleasant surprise as Iraq won the silver medal in the football tournament at the 2006 Asian Games in Doha.

Washington  - The United States was cautiously optimistic that an agreement establishing the legal basis for US troops in Iraq will be approved by the Parliament in Baghdad, with the White House saying challenges remain in finalizing the deal.

"We're nearly there, but there are a couple more hurdles that we have to get through," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said Monday, a day after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Cabinet approved the agreement.