Iran releases Iraqi POWs

NICOSIA [MENL] -- Iran released 276 Iraqi prisoners of war Wednesday.

The POWs from the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, were released during a ceremony marking the centenary of the birth of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Iranian Islamic regime.

The POWs are be bussed to the Iraqi border where the Iranian Red Crescent will witness the formal handover.

The prisoner release came just after Iran and Iraq agreed to resume negotiations on the issue.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohammed Said al-Sahaf and his Iranian counterpart, Kamal Kharazi, met on Tuesday on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York and agreed to hold talks to resolve "problems on hold," INA said but didn't say when the talks would resume.

The POW talks broke down after the last round in Baghdad two months ago with both sides blaming each other for their failure.

The issue of POWs has remained a sticking point in the normalization of ties between the two countries after the war that left hundreds of thousands dead on both sides.

Baghdad says a total of about 13,000 Iraqi soldiers remain imprisoned in Iran while Tehran says 2,806 of its troops are in detention in Iraq.

So far Iran has handed over 55,438 POWs to Iraq, while Iraq has released 39,417 Iranians. The exchanges have taken place under the supervision of the International Committee of the Red Cross.