UN doesn’t intend to send troops to Iraq, UNAMI Chief says.

KIRKUK / IraqiNews.com: The UN Secretary-General’s Representative in Iraq, Ad Melkert, has said during a visit to north Iraq’s city of Kirkuk on Wednesday that the United Nations does’nt intend to send “peace-keeping forces” to the conflict areas in the country, after the withdrawal of the U.S. troops by the end of the current year. Melkert, who conferred with Kirkuk Governor, the Province’s Council Chairman and representatives of different communities in the Province, told a news conference in Kirkuk “he was optimistic with possibility to attend progress in the settlement of Kirkuk’s problem about the areas in conflict between Baghdad and the Kurdistan government in Arbil.” “The political parties have agreed to carry out elections in the Province in the near future and the UN Mission is convinced with necessity to move from  the phase of dialogue to the phase of negotiations among those parties, because we think that such elections would serve the interests of Iraq, and Kirkuk in particular,” Melkert said. SKH (TS)/SR 848