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Spain to withdraw from Iraq
15/03/2004 11:14 - (SA)
Madrid - "The war in Iraq was a disaster, the occupation of Iraq is a disaster," Spain's prime minister-elect Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said on Monday.
He told Cadena Ser radio that Spain's 1 300 troops sent to Iraq would "evidently" be pulled out if there is no change there by June 30, the date the US has promised to transfer sovereignty to a provisional government.
That confirmed an election promise Zapatero made in the run-up to Sunday's general election, which saw Spanish voters oust the conservative Popular Party of outgoing prime minister Jose Maria Aznar.
Commentators in Spain and abroad saw the election defeat for Aznar's government as punishment for its unpopular decision to back the US invasion of Iraq and commit forces to that country's occupation.
Bomb attacks on Thursday on crowded commuter trains in Madrid that killed 200 people and which have been attributed to an Al-Qaeda threat to strike against US allies in the Iraq occupation helped tip the scales against the Popular Party and in favour of Zapatero's Socialist Party.
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