Australia rejects apology demand for Iraq shooting

CANBERRA - Australian Prime Minister John Howard said on Friday it would be inappropriate to apologise to Iraq yet for the killing of an Iraqi government bodyguard by Australian troops in a shooting mishap in Baghdad.

Australia is trying to negotiate new wheat deals worth hundreds of millions of dollars but Iraqi Trade Minister Abdul Falah al-Sudany has called for an apology for the shooting and threatened to reconsider trade deals with Australia.

Australian soldiers mistakenly opened fire on Sudany's bodyguards on Wednesday, killing one and wounding three people.

Howard said he was sorry the man had been killed but he wanted to know all the facts before he would consider a formal apology or accept any blame.

"Until I know what's happened it's not appropriate to be flinging out apologies," Howard told Australian television.

A full military inquiry is under way.

Howard said the Iraqi trade minister had told Australian diplomats in Baghdad the incident would not affect any wheat deals.

"The Iraqi trade minister told our ambassador that he greatly appreciated the letter which Mark Vaile had sent to him and that he did not want this incident to interfere with the bilateral relationship or to affect our trade relationship," Howard said referring to a letter written by his Trade Minister Mark Vaile.

Australia and the United States have been competing fiercely for the Iraq wheat import market, one of the world's biggest, since 2003.

Australia is a staunch US ally and was one of the first to join the US-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Howard's conservative government has extended an inquiry into allegations the country's monopoly wheat exporter AWB Ltd. paid A$222 million ($267.79 million) in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's former government.

A 2005 UN report alleged that AWB was one of the biggest among 2000 companies that had paid kickbacks to Saddam's government through the UN-managed "oil-for-food programme".

- REUTERS