Negotiators have finalized a deal that will see the complete withdrawal of US troops from Iraq by 2011, ending an eight-year occupation, the top Iraqi heading the team said yesterday.
Under the 27-point deal all US combat troops would be withdrawn from Iraqi cities by next June, negotiator Mohammed al-Haj Hammoud said.
The agreement has already been approved by US President George W. Bush and now needs to be endorsed by Iraqi leaders, he said.
Iraq and the US had agreed to “withdraw the US troops from Iraq by [the] end of 2011,” he said.
“The combat troops will withdraw from Iraqi cities by June 2009. Both the parties have agreed on this,” he said. “The negotiators’ job is done. Now it is up to the leaders.”
The security pact would decide the future of US forces in Iraq once the present UN mandate, which provides the legal framework for the presence of foreign forces in Iraq, expires in December.
Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki had agreed last November to formalize such an agreement by July 31.
The arrangement was delayed due to strong opposition from Iraqi leaders over key issues such as when US combat troops would withdraw from Iraq, how many bases Washington would retain and whether US troops would be immune from Iraqi laws.
Hammoud said all issues had been addressed in the deal.
However, he said that there was a possibility that US troops could leave before 2011 or remain beyond the target date.
“There is a provision that says the withdrawal could be done even before 2011 or extended beyond 2011 depending on the [security] situation,” he said.
Hammoud said that even if the withdrawal takes place by 2011, some US troops could remain “to train Iraqi security forces.”
He said the issue of how many bases Washington would retain in Iraq depended on the number of troops left behind for training purposes.
“The number of US military bases would depend on the size and the needs of the troops,” he said.
A number of committees would also look into offences committed by US troops in Iraq.
The immunity offered to US soldiers currently in Iraq has been one of the main sticking points in the negotiations, which began in February.
In a surprise one-day visit to Iraq on Thursday, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the two countries were “very, very close” to finalizing the agreement but had not yet clinched the deal.
On Thursday Zebari, however, went a step further and said the text of the deal was ready.
“We are very close, we have a text, but not the final agreement. Everything has been addressed,” Zebari said.
However, the deal has drawn sharp criticism from Iraq’s political factions. And any deal would first have to be ratified by the Iraqi parliament and the veto-wielding presidency council.
The White House said on Thursday that US lawmakers would not be asked to approve the pact.
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