UK: Iraq to run security in '07

2006-10-22 08:09

London - Iraqi soldiers and police will be ready to take over security from coalition troops within a year, British junior foreign minister Kim Howells said Saturday.

He told BBC radio that he would be surprised if Iraqi forces had not taken over command by that time.

His comments came as British troops remained on standby to re-enter the southern city of Amara.

Security control was handed over to local forces in August but they have struggled to quell Shiite militia there.

"I would have thought that certainly in a year or so there will be adequately trained Iraqi soldiers and security forces - police men and women and so on - in order to do the job," Howells said.

"I would be very surprised if there was not that kind of capacity taking on a lot of the work done by the coalition forces.

"I have not had a recent briefing on just how advanced the training is, but the messages I have been receiving are that the Iraqi army is coming along very well.

"But the problem is we do not know what the state of play is vis-a-vis the militias - how well armed they are, how sustainable their present rate of fighting is.

"Those are imponderables and the only way you are going to get that information is by speaking to the generals and intelligence services who watch these things very carefully."

Howells warned that a "big conflict" was looming between the Iraqi government and militia groups.

"We don't know what the situation on the ground will be next month let alone in a year's time," he said.

"People want instant results these days but I don't think those instant are going to come in Iraq - its going to take a lot of blood yet."

Britain and the United States are discussing a range of eight options to tackle escalating violence in Iraq, The Guardian newspaper reported on Saturday.

Courses of action being considered include a phased withdrawal, the break-up of Iraq into a federal model and "one last push" - a short-term injection of troops to create enough security to build confidence in the Iraqi government, the daily said.

Former British junior defence minister Doug Henderson predicted that Iraq could break up into at least three states, in an interview to be shown Sunday on GMTV television.

"I doubt if Iraq can be retained as one nation in the future, I hope it can be, but I think it's very unlikely that that will be the case," he said.

Prime Minister Tony Blair insisted on Wednesday that British troops would stay in Iraq as long as necessary, as he battled to face down new criticism over his strategy in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Blair has been on the defensive since army chief General Sir Richard Dannatt said recently that British troops should leave Iraq "sometime soon" because they were exacerbating Britain's security problems.

- AFP