Iraq pact raises withdrawal hopes

By Andrew North
BBC News, Baghdad

US President-elect Barack Obama supports a troop pullout by 2010

Just over three years from now, all US forces could be out of Iraq, if the Iraqi-US security pact finally comes into force.

It will also give the Iraqi authorities much greater say over what American forces do in the meantime.

With the Iraqi cabinet vote on Sunday, it has passed its first hurdle and now goes to the Iraqi parliament.

It has to be approved by the end of the year, when the UN mandate covering the presence of US and other troops ends.

In effect, this is now a deadline for both sides - for the Americans to get out and the Iraqis to take full responsibility for security.

It has come after months of difficult negotiations between Washington and Baghdad.

Staged withdrawal

The first stage will be for American troops to pull back to bases outside Iraqi cities, by the middle of next year.

Further withdrawals would then depend on security progress, with all of them gone by December 2011 - almost eight years since the invasion. That would make the conflict substantially longer than the World War II.

So even though the deal is due to come into force before he takes office, it does not necessarily conflict with campaign promises by US President-elect Barack Obama to pull out all US combat troops by the spring of 2010.

He has been kept in touch with the negotiations and he always left himself some room for manoeuvre - saying a residual US force could remain after the main pullout.

If things go well, it might be possible. But given what has happened in Iraq since the invasion and with daily attacks still continuing, few would risk any predictions.

While the cabinet was in session, a roadside bomb killed three people in Baghdad and a suicide car bomb north of the capital claimed another 14 lives.

Pressure

Some here, though, say the Americans should leave straight away and there is no need for this agreement - chief among them anti-American cleric Moqtada Sadr.

Iraq's Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr would prefer US troops out sooner

They say the deal simply entrenches the US occupation.

Part of this is due to pressure from across the border in Iran, on those Iraqi politicians it has ties with. Tehran also wants the Americans out as quick as possible.

It was a sign of these sensitivities that almost a third of the Iraqi cabinet stayed away for the vote.

But in fact, this is something of a smokescreen. There is more support than it appears.

Even some of the voices speaking out against the deal back it in private, because of the greater control it gives the Iraqi authorities over the Americans, while at the same time setting out a withdrawal timetable.

Compromise

US commanders will now have to consult more on operations, and raids on neighbouring countries like Iran or Syria - such as the one last month by US special forces - will be barred entirely.

The agreement would also see the 16,000 prisoners in US detention eventually transferred to Iraqi control.

The pact allows some Iraqi jurisdiction over US soldiers and contractors. A compromise was reached to set up a committee which will decide whether they should face an Iraqi court if they commit crimes outside their bases.

Yet the pact could still face more problems in the Iraqi parliament.

With the UN mandate due to run out in just six weeks, British officials are negotiating a similar agreement with the Iraqi government - although the UK is expected to withdraw much earlier.

The day when all foreign forces are out of Iraq appears to be drawing a little closer.