Japan calls US policy in Iraq 'naive'

TOKYO: Japan's foreign minister has criticised the United States policy in Iraq as "very naive" and blamed it for spiralling unrest there, in another swipe at US tactics by the key Washington ally.

Taro Aso said late Saturday in Kyoto that the then US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld "started off the war, but the operation after the occupation was very naive."

"Because this operation did not work well, it is in trouble now," he said, quoted by Jiji Press.

"It became clear that the operation after a war is very important when you think about peace-building."

Aso's comments came on the day a suicide bomber blew up his Mercedes truck in a Baghdad market, killing at least 130 people and injuring hundreds, in the second deadliest attack since the US-led invasion of 2003.

They follow comments by Japanese Defence Minister Fumio Kyuma who has made a series of critical remarks about US policies, which provoked displeasure from the US State Department.

Last month Kyuma said US President George W Bush was wrong to invade Iraq and warned that Tokyo might not automatically renew its air force mission to the war-torn country.

Shigeru Ishiba, then defence chief when the pacifist nation took the historic step to send troops to Iraq in January 2004, today criticized Kyuma.

"I don't know if it's appropriate for Japan, which relies on the United States the most (for national security), to make such comments when the US is going through the most difficult time," Ishiba said in a TV Asahi programme.