US, UK offer Iraq right to send foreign troops home

The two war allies fine-tuned several proposals in their draft to ease some concerns of fellow Security Council members, as well as Iraq, ahead of high-level talks this weekend on the June 30 transfer of power in Baghdad.

The new resolution will endorse the handover to the interim government unveiled in Baghdad on Tuesday.

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In the previous version, only the next Iraqi government due to be elected by the end of January would have had the authority to ask the forces to leave.

But the apparent concession seemed to bear little real import after Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Thursday that US-led troops would have to remain for "some time" to prevent a slide into chaos and civil war.

Friday's revised draft also nodded to other questions raised by council opponents, including Russian pressure over the UN inspectors who monitored Iraqi weapons programmes under Saddam Hussein.

The new text says that the council would in future consider the mandate of the inspectors, who have not returned to Iraq since the war that drove Saddam from power last year.

On Thursday, Zebari seemed to short-circuit much of the council opposition to the earlier draft, saying it was "quite adequate" on the question of Iraqi sovereignty after the end of the US occupation.

China, France, Germany and Russia had all called for various changes to the text, including strengthened language making clear that Iraq would have full sovereignty after the occupation formally ends June 30.

British ambassador Emyr Jones Parry called Zebari's remarks a "ringing endorsement" and said he expected a vote soon, although no date has yet been set.

"We are making good progress," deputy State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said in Washington. "I think we are moving toward a consensus."