(NECN: Baghdad, Iraq) - The Obama administration plans to appeal a court decision dismissing manslaughter charges against five Blackwater security guards in a 2007 Baghdad shooting. Vice President Joe Biden made the announcement Saturday morning from Iraq after meeting with Iraq's president. Biden expressed his "personal regret" over the shootings that left 17 dead. Blackwater security contractors were guarding U.S. diplomats when the guards opened fire in Nisoor Square, a crowded Baghdad intersection, on Sept. 16, 2007. Seventeen people were killed, including women and children, in a shooting that inflamed anti-American sentiment in Iraq. A lawyer for one of the guards says the United States is pursuing an innocent man, not justice. Blackwater has since changed its name to Xe Services LLC. Material from The Associated Press used in this report.