Powell: U.S., other forces would leave Iraq should Iraqis ask

U.S.-led coalition forces would leave Iraq if a new interim government should ask them to, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday, but such a request is unlikely.

Powell said the United States believes a holds that a U.N. resolution passed last year and Iraqi administrative law provide necessary authority for coalition forces to remain even beyond the scheduled June 30 handover of government to Iraqis.

“We're there to support the Iraqi people and protect them and the new government,” Powell said at a news conference with other foreign ministers from the Group of Eight nations. “I have no doubt the new government will welcome our presence and am losing no sleep over whether they will ask us to stay.”

But were the new government to say it could handle security, “then we would leave,” Powell said.



British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said stability in Iraq would not be served by an abrupt withdrawal.

“But were the government that takes over to ask us to leave, we would leave,'' Straw said. Britain is the main force other than the United States in the U.S.-led military coalition that brought down Iraq's authoritarian government last year and is trying to restore calm in the aftermath.

Powell said he expected the commander of coalition forces in Iraq to remain an American and report up his chain of command to maintain military effectiveness.

He said he expected that a consultative process can be established so the U.S. commander and the American ambassador kept the Iraqi government informed of their activities.

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said, “There has to be a complete break with the past, with the Iraqi government replacing the coalition. That is the rupture.”

He repeated that France would not now or in the future send troops to Iraq but said France would join its European partners in helping to rebuild Iraq.

Barnier said transfer of power to the interim Iraqi government must be transparent so it is legitimately acceptable to the Iraqi people and the world.

Powell said the ministers devoted considerable time to discussing Iraq “because all of us share an interest in a peaceful, stable Iraq.”

He said they also discussed the Arab-Israeli peace process and how to bring political and economic reform to a broader Middle East.

That is expected to be on the agenda when the Group of Eight holds its annual summit next month in Sea Island, Ga.

Before their talks at the State Department, Powell and the ministers met briefly at the White House with President Bush.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Bush and the ministers talked about the “mission they're working to accomplish in Iraq and about the importance of putting aside past differences and all of us working together.''