June 17, 2007	Sunday	Jumadi-us-Sani 01, 1428

BAGHDAD, June 16: US Defence Secretary Robert Gates met Iraqi leaders for talks in Baghdad on Saturday to tell them Washington is disappointed with their efforts to reconcile Iraq’s warring factions and to move ahead with renewed urgency.

Gates, who flew into Baghdad on Friday night, was also briefed by US commanders on a U.S. troop build-up intended to buy time for Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s government to reach a political accommodation with Sunni Arabs.

General David Petraeus, the top US commander in Iraq, said US troops had launched offensives against Sunni Islamist Al Qaeda hideouts around Baghdad in the past 24 hours to hunt car-bombers who have plagued the capital and elsewhere.

“For the first time we are really going to a couple of the key areas in the belts from which Al Qaeda has sallied forth with car bombs, additional fighters and so forth,” he said.

The offensive was launched as the US military confirmed it had completed its troop build-up in Iraq to 160,000 soldiers.

Nearly 28,000 additional troops have been sent to Iraq, mainly to Baghdad for a major crackdown on sectarian violence.

“We are ahead in some areas and behind in others,” Petraeus said of the four-month-old crackdown. He has previously said the success of the operation could not be judged until all the reinforcements were fully operational.

In its quarterly report on Iraq this week, the Pentagon said it was too soon to assess the crackdown. While violence was down in Baghdad, the overall level in Iraq was unchanged as militants had simply moved their bases outside the capital, it said.North of the capital, US attack helicopters firing Hellfire missiles killed six militants planting a roadside bomb near the town of Muqdadiya, the US military said. Gates’ visit and frank criticism was a sign Washington is growing increasingly frustrated with what US officials see as foot-dragging on laws on distributing oil revenues, control of regional oil fields and holding provincial elections.—Reuters