November 6, 2003	Thursday	Ramazan 10, 1424

BAGHDAD, Nov 5: Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani, who currently holds the rotating presidency of the US-appointed interim Governing Council, said on Wednesday he would visit Turkey on Nov 19, as part of a regional tour, “to ease the atmosphere.”

But he made it clear that “the question of sending Turkish soldiers is closed, as the Turkish president said.”

Several members of the Governing Council have voiced strong objections to the deployment of troops from Iraq’s powerful neighbor whose Ottoman ancestors once ruled the region.

The shelving of the proposed deployment came as a major setback to US troops facing an increasingly daring enemy.

On Tuesday night, assailants fired either rockets or mortars that landed close to the huge fortified compound known as the “green zone”, which serves as the coalition’s headquarters in Baghdad, wounding three coalition members, according to US military officials.—AFP