A senior Iranian government official said Thursday his government is willing to engage in direct talks with the US about Iraq. The US and Iran have not discussed the issue since shortly after the US invasion. An attempt to negotiate failed last year when Iran insisted the talks include other issues, while the US said it would only address Iraq. In Australia Thursday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice reaffirmed the Bush administration’s stance. Rice said: “Those talks are limited concerning the country at issue, so in this case it would be limited to questions concerning Iraq. We will see when and if those talks take place but that discretion has been there for some time and I’m sure that we’ll talk about this exercise. This isn’t a negotiation of some kind. We found it useful to exchange information and to talk. And if we do, it will be about Iraq.”