“The
more certainty you have on that (the constitution), the more you can
have a program for the draw-down of troops which is important for the
Iraqis,” Reuters quoted him as telling the British newspaper.
“Because
-- unlike in Afghanistan -- although we are part of the security
solution there, we are also part of the problem.”
The
Iraqi panel drawing up the constitution has come under intense US
pressure to submit a draft on time.
The
Iraqi parliament is due to vote on a draft constitution by August 15,
before it is put to a national referendum in October as the country
spirals deeper by the day into violence and lawlessness.
General
George Casey, the top American military commander in Iraq, said in
July that he expected troop cuts after the referendum.
A
leaked British Defense Ministry memo revealed in July that both London
and Washington are preparing to cut their troops in Iraq by more than
half in 2006.
In
an obvious retreat from his earlier stance, British Prime Minister,
Tony Blair, acknowledged on July 26 that Iraq was being used to
recruit terrorists.
Award-winning
British reporter Patrick Cockburn wrote in the Independent July
25 that the “ill-considered venture” of invading Iraq has turned
into a “mess” fueling attacks around the world and providing Al-Qaeda
with sympathizers across the Muslim world.
A
would-be London bomber arrested by Italian police has told
investigators that he and three fellows were motivated by the Iraq war
and not by religious fervor.
Unabated
Violence
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|
A British survey found that the US-led occupation was behind 37% of civilian deaths in Iraq. (Reuters).
|
On
the ground, violence continued in the war-torn country Tuesday
morning, claiming the lives of three Iraqis.
An
Iraqi police colonel died in a drive-by shooting, and two employees of
the finance ministry were killed in a second attack in Baghdad,
reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Colonel
Mizher Hamad Yusuf was just leaving home for work when he was
machine-gunned from a passing car in east Baghdad.
And
in the west of the capital, a driver and a bodyguard employed by the
ministry of finance were shot dead in their car as they were leaving
for work. In both cases the gunmen escaped.
Interior
ministry official Brigadier Salam Lutfi was killed Monday, August 1,
and two of his guards were wounded when gunmen attacked his car on a
highway in eastern Baghdad.
The
bodies of 20 people, one of them beheaded, some of them shot and
others with their hands bound behind their backs with plastic straps,
were found Monday dumped in southwest Baghdad.
And
in the northern city of Kirkuk, one Iraqi soldier was killed and six
injured when a roadside bomb struck near their patrol in Tuz Khurmatu,
60 km (40 miles) south of the city.
A
July 20 survey by the British NGO Iraq Body Count found that the
US-led occupation forces in Iraq have caused 37 percent of civilian
deaths – some 25,000 in just two years.
The
survey found that US-led occupation forces were chiefly responsible
for the huge numbers of dead civilians, with criminals and gangs a
close second at 36 percent, while resistance fighters accounted for
only 9.5 percent.
