SOME of the 170,000 coalition troops could be out of Iraq after the end of this year, the nation’s interim president Ghazi al-Yawer said today.
But he said it would be "complete nonsense" to ask them to leave Iraq "in this chaos and this vacuum of power".
He said foreign troops should leave only after Iraq’s security forces are built up, the country’s security situation has improved and
pockets of terrorists are eliminated.
"By the end of this year, we could see the number of foreign troops decreasing," al-Yawer said.
Al-Yawer, a Sunni Arab, had been critical of some US military operations in Iraq, including the three-week siege of the Sunni rebel city of Fallujah in April.
He helped negotiate an end to that siege. But the city fell into the hands of insurgents and religious zealots, forcing the Marines to recapture Fallujah last November in some of the heaviest urban combat for American forces since the Vietnam war.
"There were some mistakes" in the occupation "but to be fair, I think all in all it was positive, the contribution of the foreign forces in Iraq," al-Yawer said. "It was worth it."
He was speaking as Prime Minister Ayad Allawi urged Iraqis to unite behind democracy in the wake of the country’s historic elections.
Al-Qaida’s arm in Iraq has vowed to continue its "holy war" despite its failure to stop the voting by millions of Iraqis.
Partial results could be released soon, though final results from the hand counting of ballots could take up to 10 days, election officials said.
Despite the lack of official totals, officials in the main Shiite clergy-endorsed coalition claimed a large victory, which could raise tensions with Iraq’s Sunni Muslims, who are thought to have largely boycotted Sunday’s vote.
Insurgents struck back yesterday, killing three US Marines in a roadside bombing south of Baghdad. Guerrillas also claimed to have shot down a British C-130 transport plane that crashed on Sunday north of Baghdad. Ten military personnel were missing and presumed dead.
