BAGHDAD, 16 November 2003 — The US-led occupation of Iraq will end by June next year after the selection of a transitional government, the Iraqi Governing Council said yesterday.
“The new government will be in charge of negotiating with the occupying forces over how to regulate their presence in the country,” Jalal Talabani, who heads the US-appointed Governing Counsel, told reporters after a six-hour meeting with top US administrator Paul Bremer. On Friday, Bremer returned to Baghdad following emergency talks in Washington to brief the 23-seat body on the Bush administration’s policy shift regarding a return of Iraqi sovereignty.
Senior administration officials told reporters that the proposed changes included forming a new government before a constitution is written, thus granting Iraq sovereignty by the middle of 2004. Previously, the Bush administration had insisted that a new charter be written and adopted before general elections are held, a process that was likely to last at least another year.
Talabani stressed during the press conference that the end of the US occupation would not necessarily mean the departure of all American troops. However, Talabani said they would have a new status.
Council member Ahmad Chalabi said the selection of a transitional government should be “internationally recognized” and with “full sovereignty.”
Yesterday, a roadside bomb exploded next to a patrol in Baghdad’s northern Ad Hamiah neighborhood killing a US soldier and injuring two others, a statement said. The wounded were evacuated to a military hospital in central Baghdad.
The dead American soldier was the 400th US serviceman to die in Iraq since hostilities started March 20. The British military has reported 52 deaths so far in Iraq. Seventeen Italian service members also have died, along with one soldier each from Denmark, Spain, Ukraine and Poland.
