BAGHDAD - Iraq wants to open a new page with former foe Iran and establish relations based on mutual confidence and good neighborliness, a member of Iraq's interim Governing Council said Tuesday.

"Relations between the two countries are marked by decades of mistrust and conflict under the former regime of Saddam Hussein," Muwaffak al-Rubai said.

"The council wants to cooperate with Iran to settle outstanding issues," such as prisoners from the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war and border controls aimed at cutting down drug trafficking, Rubai said as quoted by AFP.

The U.S.-appointed council also wanted Tehran to "recognize the new Iraqi power and support it security-wise," he said.

An Iranian delegation, led by senior foreign ministry official Hossein Sadeqi, met in Baghdad Monday with council members in the first visit by Iranian officials to the country since Saddam was overthrown by U.S.-led forces in April.

Iran took a cautious approach to the Governing Council when it was inaugurated last month under the auspices of the US-led occupation administration.

Thirteen of the council's 25 members are from the Shiite community, which is dominant in Iran and also makes up a majority of about 60 percent of the Iraqi population. The Iraq official said, "We talked with Iranian diplomats regarding facilitating the pilgrimage trips of both the Iranians wishing to visit Karbala and Najaf, and the Iraqis wishing to visit Imam Reza's shrine in Mashhad, as well as ways of boosting bilateral trade, political, and cultural ties."

The head of the Iraq Chamber of Commerce, Hessam Al-Tofeili, also called Tuesday for further expansion of economic relations with Iran, particularly on the provision of economic incentives for the two countries' businessmen.

Speaking on the sidelines of the Conference on Development of Iran-Iraq Economic and Trade Ties, Al-Tofeili said Iraq seeks unbridled economic relations with Iran particularly by their private sectors.

He urged officials of both countries to approve the necessary measures to spur business interaction by the two sides.

"The time is ripe for Iranian officials to invade the Iraqi market by removing tariff barriers," he said as carried by IRNA.

The two-day conference kicked off in Kermanshah, western Iran, on Monday; the conference is attended by officials of the two countries, the heads of the respective chambers of commerce and businessmen from the two sides.

Speaking at the seminar Deputy Commerce Minister Mojtaba Khosro- taj said Iran's foreign trade policy gives priority to expand trade with other Muslim states and all of nation's officials firmly support this trade policy.

On another issue, Khosro-taj also the head of Iran Export Promotion Center (IEPC) pointed to Iran-Iraq historical and thriving trade ties.