Posted on 05/25/2004 7:18:38 AM PDT by TexKat
LONDON (AFP) - The interim Iraqi government will have "final political control" over coalition military action following the June 30 transfer of sovereignty, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Tuesday.
Blair was speaking less than an hour after Iraq's interim defence minister, in London for a meeting with the prime minister and others, said he expected foreign troops to remain in his country for "months rather than years".
Blair's comments add flesh to a plan for guiding Iraq towards self-rule outlined the previous night by US President George W. Bush.
This would see a transitional administration take over on June 30 head of elections early next year, Bush said in a speech at Army War College in Pennsylvania designed to bolster flagging support for the occupation.
Asked at a Downing Street press conference whether Iraqi ministers would have a veto over military action such as a renewed assault on the restive Iraqi city of Fallujah following June 30, Blair said this would be the case.
"If there is a political decision as to whether you go into a place like Fallujah in a particular way, that has to be done with the consent of the Iraqi government," he told reporters.
"And the final political control remains with the Iraqi government. And that's what the transfer of sovereignty means."
Blair added: "The transfer of sovereignty has to be real and genuine."
Specific operational issues would have to be decided on the ground between coalition commanders and the interim government, the premier said.
"But the key thing is, once that political control transfers, it transfers. The troops then remain in Iraq with the consent of the Iraqi government."
Earlier Tuesday, Iraqi interim defence minister Ali Allawi hinted that once sovereignty was transferred, Baghdad was likely to want foreign troops out of the country relatively soon.
"In terms of time for the presence of the international forces to help us establish security and stability, I think it will be a question of months rather than years," Allawi told a joint press conference in London with British Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon.
"The multinational force, in as much as its presence is needed to maintain security, will need ... to be replaced by indigenous forces, by Iraqi forces," Allawi said.
This replacement process should be done "in the course of a year", Allawi said. "Hopefully towards the end of the year, certainly before the elections, we should have an Iraqi security force, by and large."
At the same press conference, Hoon refused to say whether London would be dispatching extra British troops to Iraq ahead of the sovereignty transfer.
"We keep the requirement for troop levels under constant review, we are in constant contact with our officer commanding on the ground in southern Iraq, and obviously in the light of his request, his judgement of the security situation, we will make appropriate decisions," he said.
"But we have not taken any decisions at this stage to send extra troops to Iraq."
A series of newspaper reports have said that London is preparing to send as many as 3,000 more troops to Iraq to help ensure stability ahead of June 30 and fill the gap left by withdrawn Spanish forces.
Such a move could, however, prove highly unpopular for Blair's government, with a newspaper poll saying Tuesday that 86 percent of Britons opposed this.
Eighty-four percent also felt that, if reinforcements had to be sent, they should serve only under British commanders and in British-controlled areas, the opinion poll for the Guardian newspaper indicated.
Ping.
There is no reason to be this is true and accurate. Particularly considering the source. In fact, it is NOT true and accurate. The exact terminology is that local authorities will "have a say" in military operations as they have all along. Nor is there any reason to doubt the President when he says, as he did last night, that our troops will be there for some time.
This could be really dicey. I'm afraid that if our troops are ordered out, Iraq will become a radical Islamist state.
WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Colin Powell said Tuesday it is critical that the world see the transfer of sovereignty back to the Iraqi people as genuine, even if U.S. forces have to remain for now to protect the fledgling democracy.
"This is what the people have wanted and they are going to see it on the 30th of June as the Coalition Provisional Authority comes to an end," Powell said.
Appearing on morning news shows a day after President Bush gave a nationally broadcast speech citing steps aimed at sealing democracy there, Powell acknowledged that it's too early to think about U.S. troops coming home.
"I would also point out that we are going to stay there to provide security assistance to this new government because it will take awhile for them to develop their own forces and develop the capability to govern effectively," he said on ABC's "Good Morning America."
Powell appeared on television as criticism began to mount in some quarters to the new joint U.S.-British U.N. resolution on Iraq; several Security Council member nations demanded greater Iraqi control over security and the U.S.-led multinational force that will try to restore stability there.
The secretary also conceded, in an interview on NBC's "Today" show, that the United States "perhaps underestimated the extent of the resistance" that would be waged against its forces after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
"I don't think we anticipated that the regime elements would be able to regather their strength and come back and threaten us the way they do," he said.
"These former regime elements, anti-coalition people as we call them — terrorists — are determined to keep Iraq from having self-government, to keep Iraq from electing its own leaders," he said on ABC. "We can't allow that to happen."
Powell said the new U.N. initiative offers other nations an opportunity to join the United States and its coalition partners in smoothing the transition to democracy and said that does not necessarily have to involve dispatching fighting forces.
"There may be other contributions they can make. ... They realize that it is in our mutual interest for us to succeed in making Iraq a democracy even if they are not prepared to commit military forces to that," Powell told NBC. He said Bush will discuss options with his NATO allies at a meeting in Istanbul, Turkey, at the end of June.
Asked on CBS's "The Early Show" whether he believes the new Iraqi government will ask U.S. military forcers to leave, Powell replied, "Realistically, I don't see it as a possibility any time in the near term. But it was an important statement because what people really don't understand yet is that when we say we are returning full sovereignty, we mean that."
"On the 30th of June and over into the first of July," he said, "Ambassador (L. Paul) Bremer and the Coalition Provisional Authority will go away. It will no longer be there, and so authority will rest fully in the hands of this interim Iraqi government, with our new ambassador (John Negroponte) and our embassy playing the role it would play in any other country."
2 By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer
UNITED NATIONS - Security Council nations gave a generally positive response to the U.S.-British blueprint for a post-occupation Iraqi government but several demanded greater Iraqi control over security and the U.S.-led multinational force that will try to restore stability.
The introduction of a draft resolution Monday by Iraq's occupying powers set the stage for intense negotiations with longtime critics of the war, such as France and Germany, who are demanding that Iraq's interim government be the key decision-maker on security issues.
In Berlin on Tuesday, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer called the U.S.-British plan a "very good foundation" for efforts to reach a consensus at the United Nations.
In Paris, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said the draft resolution "needs improvements" and France hopes to have a say in new talks over Iraqi sovereignty. He declined to elaborate.
France led the opposition to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, insisting that military intervention needed U.N. backing to be legitimate.
The United States and Britain unveiled the long-awaited plan hours before President Bush said in a nationally televised address that American forces would stay in Iraq until it was free and democratic.
The resolution is an attempt by the Bush administration to win international backing for the post-occupation plans in Iraq, which have been severely shaken by violence. With his approval ratings sinking after repeated setbacks in Iraq, Bush is also seeking to rebuild support at home.
Under the resolution, the multinational force would be authorized to take "all necessary measures" to maintain security and prevent terrorism, while no mention is made of the Iraqi army — except the need for training.
The mandate for U.S.-led forces in Iraq would be reviewed after a year — or even earlier if a transitional government due to take power after January elections requests it. But U.S. deputy ambassador James Cunningham said the United States will keep its promise "that we will leave if there's a request from the government to leave," which he called highly unlikely.
Council members said one of the major concerns raised during closed-door discussions after the resolution was introduced on Monday was the question of whether sovereignty is really being restored — or whether the occupation would continue under another guise.
Doubts over the government's legitimacy would undermine Washington's claims that the June 30 handover of power represents a major change in Iraq, with the official end of the U.S.-led occupation that many Iraqis resent.
Many in Iraq and in Europe fear that the interim government will not be seen as legitimate if it doesn't have a credible voice in the operations of armed forces on its own soil.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said the new Iraqi government "must be able to make decisions over security issues or else it won't be truly sovereign."
Moscow has yet to give its official reaction but a Russian diplomat said the draft raises numerous questions and needs changes. The unnamed diplomat spoke to the Interfax news agency.
China expressed support for the plan and urged the early establishment of a new Iraq with "political sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity."
French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier told reporters that Paris seeks a timeline for handing over control of Iraqi armed forces. The Iraqi government should "in time" have "authority over police forces and the Iraqi army," he said.
Human Rights Watch criticized the draft, saying the United States and Britain will retain ultimate responsibility for security and human rights and Iraq's new interim leaders will not have full authority to govern the country.
Cunningham and Britain's U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry insist that the resolution will return all sovereignty to the Iraqis — and they argued that neither the United States, Britain nor the Security Council should be dictating to a sovereign Iraq what it should and shouldn't do.
"The important thing is that the political responsibility for taking decisions for the presence of the multinational force, for the development of a constitution, for the development of the political process, are going into Iraqi hands," Cunningham said. "It's not for the Security Council to tell them how to do it. It's for them — it's their process."
With the June 30 transfer of sovereignty looming, Washington and London decided to start negotiations on the 2,400-word resolution, even though U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is still working on the makeup of the interim government. Key areas of the text will need to be filled in after Brahimi returns and the interim government is established — including how it will coordinate with the multinational force.
U.S. and British officials said once the government is formed, the multinational force commander is expected to send a letter spelling out how the force will relate to the interim government. The new Iraqi leadership is also expected to send a letter welcoming the Security Council resolution and U.N. help in the political process, and agreeing that the multinational force should remain in Iraq, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
A British official said London hopes the letters will create a National Security Committee on which Iraqis would sit, giving them veto power over major military operations — like April's offensive in Fallujah that outraged many Iraqis. Germany has called for such a council as a vehicle for sharing power.
On Tuesday, Iraqi Deputy Foreign Minister Hamed Bayati told The Associated Press the resolution and Bush's speech "included many positive points such as the decision to give full sovereignty to Iraqis rather than limited sovereignty and giving a role for the UN which Iraqis kept pushing for."
"After 12 months this government will advise the UN and the U.S. whether to stay or leave. Another positive point is that this very government will be in control of Iraq's oil revenues," he said.
In Baghdad, Mahmoud Othman, a Sunni Kurd member of the Governing Council, said the multinational forces should be under United Nations' command — a possibility ruled out by the Americans and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
WASHINGTON (AFP) - US President George W. Bush said that he and French President Jacques Chirac have the same goals for Iraq's future.
"I had a great conversation with Jacques Chirac," Bush told reporters at the White House as he received a group of Iraqis treated in the United States after being maimed under the regime of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites).
"We share the same goal: a free and stable and peaceful Iraq," Bush said.
The French president told Bush in a telephone conversation Tuesday that a proposed US and British draft UN resolution on the future of Iraq is a good "basis for discussion" but needs further work, Chirac's spokeswoman Catherine Colonna said.
Chirac said attention needed to be paid to the responsibilities of the future Iraqi government -- notably its control over oil resources -- as well as security and the mandate of a future multinational force, Colonna said.
Relations between France and the United States were badly damaged by the war in Iraq, and contacts between the two leaders have been rare and formal.
The US-British resolution, presented to the UN on Monday, is designed to accompany the June 30 handover of power to the Iraqis.
"What President Chirac and others have said is they want to make sure that the transfer of sovereignty to the interim government is a real transfer," Bush said.
"And that's what we want. We want there to be a complete and real transfer of sovereignty so that the Iraqi citizens realize the fate of their country is now their responsibility.
"And we'll be there to help. And we'll help in a variety of ways. We'll help by making sure our security forces are there to work with their security forces. We'll help to make sure the reconstruction money we have set aside is well spent," Bush added.
Uh, when that happens, can we actually shoot to kill? Or is that not PC enough. We can't offend or humiliate them. We have to let them take over the world and apologize for not doing it fast enough. What more do the RATS and the rest of the Euroweenies want? All of us dead, I guess.
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