From AFX via Forbes:
TEHRAN – Iraqi President Jalal Talabani wrapped up a landmark visit to neighbouring Iran today, saying he had won promises of support for his bid to end the insurgency ravaging his country.
‘Iran is interested in our security just as it is interested in its own security. We should use all means to establish security in Iraq,’ Talabani said as he was seen off by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Talabani is the first Iraqi head of state to visit Iran since the late 1960s. He said he had received pledges of support in his closed-door talks with Ahmadinejad and Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Khamenei told Talabani that foreign troops were the cause of violence and that Iraqi authorities should demand a timetable for a pull-out.
‘The Islamic Republic of Iran holds the American government responsible for the suffering of the Iraqi people and all the crimes and assassinations now being committed in Iraq,’ Khamenei was quoted as saying by official media.
‘The presence of foreign troops is damaging for the Iraqis, and the Iraqi government could ask for their departure by proposing a timetable,’ Khamenei asserted, adding that ‘the US and Britain will eventually have to leave Iraq with a bitter experience.’…