"A U.S. security delegation will visit Syria on Wednesday in a sign of growing cooperation between the two countries since U.S. President Barack Obama started talking with the Damascus government, diplomats said.
Security cooperation on Iraq has been a main goal of the U.S. rapprochement with Syria, which has led to U.S. support for resuming peace talks between Syria and Israel and an announcement that Washington would send back an ambassador to Damascus after a four-year break.
"The Americans have presented the Syrians with names of main facilitators of insurgents they want captured," one of the diplomats told Reuters.
Also included in the delegation are an official from the office of the Secretary of Defense and State Department official Frederick Hoff, who is responsible for bridging differences on territorial issues between Israel and Syria that contributed to the breakdown of previous peace talks.
The State Department official said the visit, which comes as a resurgence of violence hits Iraq, "will focus on continuing our dialogue in more detail concerning opportunities for cooperation on regional security matters."
TOP IRAQI BAATHIST OUT
Syria, the diplomats said, already this year expelled Mohammad Younis, a main figure in the outlawed Iraqi Baath Party, who is wanted by the U.S.-backed Iraqi government but has little military operational importance on the ground.
The diplomats said President Bashar al-Assad agreed to the U.S. security team's visit during a meeting last month in Damascus with George Mitchell, the U.S. Middle East envoy. The meeting also discussed re-starting peace talks between Syria and Israel. The Turkish-mediated talks were formally suspended during the Israeli invasion of Gaza in December.....
In another possible breakthrough, the diplomats said that Washington has invited Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Fayssal al-Mekdad to Washington for talks on Iraq, but the visit has not been yet finalized...."
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