Length: 2:58
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Michael reports the latest developments in the Status of Forces Agreement discussions: the Iraqis say they can take over and set the terms for our troops to remain in the country.
Unfortunately, the satellite feed from Baghdad was lost before he could go into detail; however, there is more about this in the next two clips.
KYRA
PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: And breaking news just coming
in to American Morning. The future of American troops
in Iraq being discussed right now. The U.S. and Iraq
apparently in deep discussions about a very sensitive
negotiation process aimed at charting the course of
the security mission, but the deadline is rapidly
approaching. We're going to be talking more about
that.
CNN is in Baghdad this morning. And our Michael Ware
is watching the developments right now.
Michael, tell us about the developments.
MICHAEL WARE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Okay,
Kyra. Essentially the U.S. mission at Iraq is yet
another make or break moment. What's happening right
now is that the United Nations authority for the U.S.
troops to be here is running out -- clock is ticking
down to the end of the year. So Washington is trying
to broker an agreement with Baghdad to regulate the
presence of U.S. Forces. Now, these are those
negotiations.
There's been some dramatic developments this week,
some of which we'll tell you about exclusively right
now. First of all, we had the Iraqi Prime Minister
visiting neighboring Amman, this morning saying the
negotiations are in deadlock. He then quickly pulled
that back a little bit to say -- well, the
negotiations over America's first draft of the
agreement are in deadlock.
Yet we can tell you now that yesterday we interviewed
one of the senior aides to the prime minister. And he
said that just this week, America in fact delivered a
second draft of the agreement. And he said that in
principle, nothing has changed from the first draft
and it's going to be rejected as well.
So it seems to confirm the prime minister's initial,
perhaps more truthful statement that the negotiations
over this critical arrangement for America have been
stalled and are in deadlock. What we can also tell
you is that there's another option.
The Iraqis may go it alone. The Iraqis are saying
that they can go and create their own laws and they
will dictate to America under what terms your troops
will remain here. This could determine the fate of
the U.S. mission in Iraq.
(satellite feed lost)
PHILLIPS: All right. We apologize for that. We just
lost Michael Ware out of Baghdad. But pretty
interesting developments right now, talking about
this Iraq-U.S. security plan. You know there's been
huge debate right now about whether troops should
stay in Iraq, how long troops will stay in Iraq. It's
one of the main discussion points among all the
presidential candidates right now.
Michael Ware coming in to us, bringing this
developing news that Nuri al-Maliki, the prime
minister of Iraq, saying that a long-term security
pact right now has reached a dead end. So what
exactly does that mean and is this a decision that
can be made before a new president is elected in the
United States?
One of the most volatile issues, of course, on the
plate, on the campaign trail right now. We'll try and
get Michael back to talk about this more. But at this
point, getting word out of Iraq of this long-term
security pact in Iraq reaching a dead end.
Negotiations of course still continue.