Putting the United Nations in charge of the Iraqi occupation would not stop the bloody insurgency that has claimed hundreds of lives this month, White House national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Sunday.
"The idea that somehow if there were a UN flag instead of a coalition flag, that these thugs would not be attacking, is, frankly, I think, just a little bit naive," she told ABC television.
"The UN is not the panacea here," she said.
"In August, they went after the UN," she said, referring to the truck bombing outside the UN compound in Baghdad that killed 23 people.
"These same regime loyalists and perhaps foreign terrorists, attacked the United Nations in a way that the United Nations had not been attacked, really, in its history, killing the special representative of the secretary general, Sergio de Mello."
"The UN doesn't somehow protect you from people who are determined to stop the Iraqi transition" to sovereignty, Rice said.
Around 90 US soldiers and more than 700 Iraqis have been killed this month as US-led force have struggled to put down an insurgency in several Iraqi cities.
But Rice repeated US support for UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi's efforts to facilitate the handover of power in Iraq, set for June 30.
"The UN is playing an important central role for what Lakhdar Brahimi is doing in helping to arrange the political transition," she said.
NO NEGOTIATIONS WITH HOSTAGE-TAKERS: The United States will not negotiate with hostage-takers in Iraq, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Sunday, one day after the captors of a US soldier asked for a prisoner swap.
"The president of the United States doesn't negotiate with terrorists," she said. Rice declined to comment on the possibility of a prisoner swap, in a series of interviews with US television.
"We are working, as you might imagine, to try and see what can be done to free hostages," she told Fox television.
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