White House Sends Official to Baghdad

AP ^ | 3/13/04 | Deb Riechmann

[Jean S]

WASHINGTON (AP) - With less than four months before a deadline to transfer Iraqi sovereignty to the people, the Bush administration has dispatched a senior White House official to Baghdad to help form an interim government - action that's needed before any handoff of power.

In Baghdad, coalition spokesman Dan Senor identified the official as Robert Blackwill, deputy national security adviser for strategic planning at the National Security Council staff. Senor says Blackwill visits Iraq every four to six weeks.

This time, Blackwill is working to resolve problems some Shiite members of the Iraqi Governing Council have with the interim constitution the council signed on Monday, a senior administration official said Saturday. He also is tasked with convincing the Iraqi Governing Council to let the United Nations help set up elections, which are scheduled to be held before the end of the year.

"We're trying hard just to get the U.N. to play a role in helping us work with the parties in the region to come up with a way forward to elections and a way forward to an interim government," Secretary of State Colin Powell told the National Journal in an interview on Friday.

The United States wants the United Nations to return to Iraq to help figure out how to form an interim government. The United Nations recalled its diplomatic staff after suicide bombings rocked its headquarters in Baghdad in August and October.

Earlier this week, an influential Shiite cleric suggested that parts of the interim constitution encroached on the powers of a future elected parliament. Some members of the governing council who belong to the majority Shiite group say they may propose changes or revisions to the interim document they just signed because they fear it means they'll eventually lose power under a new government.

Meantime, a growing number of lawmakers are worrying out loud about the Bush administration's ironclad deadline for handing over political control to Iraq this summer, with even Republicans questioning who will rule and whether the Iraqis will be up to it.

But Powell was insistent that the U.S. -led occupation will end by July 1.

"We are staying in charge of this until the 30th of June under the CPA (Coalition Provisional Authority) and on the 30th of June, it will be handed over, not to the U.N., but to an Iraqi government," Powell said.

The United Nations, then, can play a more active role in helping the new Iraqi government prepare for elections, he said.

AP-ES-03-13-04 1528EST