The US handed sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government two days earlier than expected yesterday, aiming to forestall guerrilla attacks with a secretive ceremony formally ending 14 months of occupation.
Iraq's outgoing US governor Paul Bremer handed a letter to Iraq leaders sealing the formal transfer of powers before immediately flying out of the country.
The low-key ceremony was over before it was announced and came as a surprise to ordinary Iraqis. Its hurried and furtive nature appeared to reflect fears that guerrillas could stage a spectacular attack on the scheduled date of June 30.
At a second ceremony in the afternoon -- this time broadcast live on Iraqi television -- the government was sworn in and Prime Minister Iyad Allawi urged all Iraqis to stand together against foreign militants wreaking havoc in the country.
"I call on our people to stand united to expel the foreign terrorists who are killing our children and destroying our country," Allawi said, in comments broadcast around the world.
At the earlier ceremony, which formally transferred sovereignty at 10:26am, President Ghazi Yawar hailed "a historic day, a happy day, a day that all Iraqis have been looking forward to".
US and British officials say the handover is a key step on the path to democracy in Iraq, but one of the government's first actions as a sovereign power is expected to be the imposition of emergency laws, including curfews, to crack down on guerrillas.
US officials attending a NATO summit in Istanbul admitted that thwarting a surge in attacks believed planned for tomorrow's formal handover date was a factor in the decision to advance it to yesterday, which they said Allawi had requested.
"We have said all along that we believed that the terrorists on the ground were going to do everything they can to literally and figuratively blow up the handover of sovereignty," one official said.
Such an attack could have damaged attempts by US President George W. Bush to be seen to be starting to disengage from Iraq, where hundreds of US soldiers have died since last year's invasion.
Although Allawi's government will have "full sovereignty", according to a UN Security Council resolution, there are important constraints on its powers.
It is barred from making long-term policy decisions and will not have control over more than 160,000 foreign troops who will remain in Iraq.
The government has the right to ask them to leave, but has made clear it has no intention of doing so.
Allawi said after the handover that he was committed to holding elections in January as scheduled.
As part of the handover, former president Saddam Hussein will soon go before an Iraqi judge to be charged and transferred to Iraqi legal custody, but will still be physically held by US-led forces, a military official said.
In other developments, a roadside bomb killed a British soldier in the southern city of Basra and wounded two others yesterday morning.
Also see story:
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS