Word: rice
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a surprise visit to Iraq. News of her arrival in Baghdad quickly spread through the city, where sandstorms swirled late in the day. Residents near the Green Zone heard at least one explosion in the vicinity of the compound, which has been bombed repeatedly by Mahdi Army fighters since the crisis began. Rice, who was traveling in the Middle East to attend regional conferences, told reporters she came to Iraq because she wanted to highlight what she described as political progress made by the Iraqi government towards reconciling the country's violently...
...This is, I think, an important time," said Rice, who credited al-Maliki's confrontation with al-Sadr's Shi'ite militia with shoring up government support among Iraq's Kurds and Sunnis. "You've seen a coalescing of a center in Iraqi politics." Maliki, also a Shi'ite, had drawn criticism in the past by Sunni factions in particular for failing to crack down on the Mahdi Army, which is blamed for much of the sectarian violence in Iraq...
...There are those who questioned whether or not the prime minister was prepared to go after militias that were associated one way or another with political elements in his coalition," Rice said. "I think he's answering that question...
Good idea: but then Hamas blew up the border wall between Gaza and Egypt, making themselves, not Abbas or Israel, real liberators in the eyes of many Arabs and Palestinians, and making a paper-only deal seem like just that. Though Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice continues to work the issue ahead of Bush's trip to celebrate Israel's 60th anniversary in mid-May, even White House spokesperson Dana Perino admits, "We have a hell of a lot of work...
...Damascus in key areas of U.S. concern. Specter said he had been told by King Abdullah of Jordan that "the item that is most on the mind of President Bashar Assad is the action of the international tribunal which could lead to his indictment." But Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice quickly slapped down Specter's proposal: "I don't think that it would be appropriate to suggest that we might be willing to limit the scope of this tribunal on the assassination of Rafik Hariri ... because it might somehow implicate either the regime or the Assad family," she said...