Bush meets with Iraqi interim president

US President George W. Bush discussed Iraq, Iran and Syria with Iraq's interim President Ghazi al-Yawar on Wednesday, senior US administration officials said Wednesday in Savannah, United States.

The two leaders, who met on the sidelines of the ongoing Group of Eight (G-8) summit that opened in Sea Island on Tuesday, discussed the need to concentrate on restoring electricity in Iraq, rebuilding Iraq's security forces and the need for US aid to be readily available, they said.

They also discussed the need for Syria to control its borders and for Iran to behave responsibly, at Bush's first meeting with al-Yawar since the latter was swore in on June 1 as the interim Iraqi president.

The officials said that al-Yawar pledged at the meeting that the Iraqi leadership would do everything they can to get the Syrians to be responsible on the border, and to get the Syrians to return frozen assets to Iraq.

Bush and al-Yawar also talked some about Iran as a neighbor and the need for Iran to behave responsibly.

At a photo opportunity with al-Yawar earlier Tuesday, Bush said he has "great faith" in the future of Iraq after he had talked with the interim Iraqi president, and reiterated the US pledge that it would transfer "full sovereignty of Iraq" scheduled for June 30.

Al-Yawar, together with leaders from Afghanistan, Algeria, Turkey, Bahrain, Jordan and Yemen, was invited to a working lunch on Wednesday with G-8 leaders in Sea Island, some 120 km from here, in the southeastern US state of Georgia.

Al-Yawar said Iraq was moving in a steady steps towards democracy, and the Iraqis were determined to have a "free, democratic, federal Iraq," "a country that is a source of stability to the Middle East."

With the presence of Iraq's interim president at the summit, Bush was reportedly trying to promote the appointment of al-Yawar as proof that the US year-long struggle to pacify and democratize Iraq was working.