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Riyadh: Saudi Arabia said there was no truth in an article by a Saudi security adviser suggesting the kingdom would back Iraq's Sunnis in the event of a wider sectarian conflict.
Nawaf Obaid, a security adviser to the Saudi government, said on Wednesday the kingdom would intervene with funding and weaponry to prevent Shiite militias attacking Iraq's Sunnis once the United States begins pulling out of Iraq.
"There is no basis in truth to the article by the writer Nawaf Obaid in the Washington Post," the Saudi Press Agency quoted an "official source" as saying.
"The writer does not represent any official body in Saudi Arabia. What he published only represents his personal opinion and does not in any manner at all represent the policy or positions of the kingdom," it added.
A senior Iraqi Shiite leader who is meeting US President George W. Bush tomorrow rejected a suggestion for an international conference on Iraq, saying yesterday that it is "illegal" and "unrealistic".
Abdul Aziz Al Hakim, who is due to have a White House meeting with Bush to discuss ways to end the Sunni-Shiite violence raging in Iraq, also played down fears that his country is facing civil war.
Al Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, categorised the conflict in Iraq as "political" rather than sectarian.
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