BAGHDAD, 21 July 2003 — Iraq could have a sovereign government in place within the next year, top US civil administrator for Iraq Paul Bremer said yesterday. “It’s possible that we could indeed have a sovereign government in a year,” Bremer told Fox News television in an interview.
But he cautioned that the speed with which Iraq attains independence would depend on how quickly the country can tackle the job of drafting a constitution, adding that he hoped a constitutional conference could be convened in September.
Bremer also said deposed dictator Saddam Hussein is likely still alive and hiding out in Iraq, but will not be able to marshal the support for a comeback. “There is no public support for him. He is not coming back. But it would certainly be better if we had him in our hands or if he were dead,” Bremer said during the interview.
Amnesty International accused US troops of “very severe” human rights abuses in Iraq and complained that it had been denied access to thousands of prisoners held without charge in “appalling” conditions.
Amnesty spokeswoman Judit Arenas Licea said some Iraqis had been forced to stand under the blistering sun for up to 48 hours in US-run detention centers that lack proper sanitation and that relatives had no information on their plight.
Two US soldiers were killed in northern Iraq yesterday and an Iraqi UN driver died after a United Nations convoy came under fire for the first time.
The deaths of four of its soldiers within 48 hours added to domestic pressure on the United States to persuade reluctant allies who opposed its invasion now to share the burden in Iraq. A foreign staffer with the UN-affiliated International Organization for Migration (IOM) was slightly injured and the driver killed when their vehicle veered into a bus after being raked by gunfire from a passing car south of the capital.
A US military spokesman said two soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division were killed and a third wounded in an ambush by gunmen firing rocket-propelled grenades west of Mosul. The four deaths since Friday brought to 37 the number of troops killed since President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1.
To the south of Baghdad in Najaf, more than 10,000 angry demonstrators reluctantly dispersed only after a show of force by US Marines who fixed bayonets and threatened the crowd.
Enraged by reports of US harassment of a radical young Shiite preacher after he condemned the new governing council, some of the cleric’s aides warned of an “uprising” if the troops did not quit Najaf.
US troops began recruiting Iraqis for a new army to replace Saddam’s rapidly routed force. The US regional commander said thousands could be armed to join the struggle against what Washington says are small bands of pro-Saddam guerrillas.
— With input from Agencies
