Topic: Iraq conference to discuss foreign troop withdrawal

Team Infidel

by Ammar Karim


BAGHDAD, Nov 21 (AFP) - An Iraqi national reconciliation conference to be
held early next year in Baghdad will discuss a timetable for the withdrawal
of occupation forces from the war-torn country, the foreign ministry said
Monday.

The decision was reached Sunday at an Arab League-sponsored meeting in Cairo
of representatives from the Iraqi government and political parties, despite
bickering among the country's divided communities.

The "national accord conference" will take place in late February or early
March, the foreign ministry said in a statement, with one of the key points
on the agenda "the setting of a timetable for ending the occupation."

The conference, which will also aim to expand political dialogue between
rival Iraqi factions, will be held after a new government is installed in
Iraq following the December 15 general election.

Iraq's President Jalal Talabani, speaking in Cairo, also extended a hand to
insurgents urging them to engage in political dialogue instead of fighting.

Iraq's most feared insurgent group, Al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by Jordanian-born
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, immediately rejected any dialogue, saying "the sword
and blood" were the only ways forward.

"There will only be between us the dialogue of the sword and of blood that
they will pay as the price for what they have done with their own hands,"
the group said in a statement whose authenticity could not be verified.

The statement came amid reports that US forces had killed a number of senior
Al-Qaeda leaders in a house in the main northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

But the White House discounted reports Zarqawi himself might have been among
the victims.

White House spokesman Trent Duffy, speaking in Beijing where President
George W. Bush was wrapping up a trip to China, desribed the story as
"highly unlikely, not credible."

Meanwhile, four civilians were killed and 10 wounded when a car bomb blew up
Monday in Kanaan, 60 kilometres (37 miles) northeast of Baghdad, police
said.

The bomb apparently targeted a passing US military convoy, but the military
vehicles escaped unscathed, police said.

The attack followed a wave of bombings in the past few days that have killed
more than 120 people, mainly Shiite Muslims, as well as eight US servicemen
and a British soldier.

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Sunday that Washington would stay
the course in Iraq despite growing criticism of the war at home.

He insisted that the number of US troops in Iraq would be reduced back to
around 138,000 after the December election and remain at that level until US
commanders have firm evidence that Iraqi security forces are capable of
managing the security situation.

"The president has said, (top US commander George) Casey has said, I have
said repeatedly what the arrangements are and the arrangements are that the
passover of responsibility to the Iraqis will be condition based," Rumsfeld
said.

"It will depend on what takes place on the ground," he said.

"We currently have about 159,000 troops in Iraq, we plan to bring that down
to 137,000-138,000 after the elections which has been our base line. We're
bulked up right now because of the elections coming up December 15."

Rumsfeld said withdrawal of American forces will only happen when the
security situation improves despite some political calls in Washington for
an early troop pullout.

Meanwhile, the South Korean government approved a plan to reduce its own
military presence in Iraq by one-third next year, officials in the prime
minister's office said.

A cabinet meeting decided to withdraw 1,000 troops from the 3,200-strong
South Korean contingent in Iraq in the first half of 2006.

The bill stipulates that the reduced contingent of troops would extend their
stay in Iraq until December 2006.

South Korean troops have been stationed in the northern Iraqi town of Arbil
for relief and rehabiliation efforts since 2004.

__________________