BRITAIN URGES SPEEDUP IN IRAQ

Faster Transition to Iraqi Authority Seen as Bid for Greater U.N. Support

  Informe de Colum Lynch en “The Washington Post” del 09.10.2003

 UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 8 -- The British government has appealed to the United States to consider accelerating its schedule for transferring authority to an Iraqi provisional government, as part of a renewed effort to secure broader United Nations support for their occupation of Iraq, Security Council diplomats said today.

The initiative reflects mounting concern by Washington's closest military ally that a U.S.-drafted resolution calling for a stronger U.N. role in Iraq could face defeat in the Security Council unless the United States agrees to yield greater power to Iraqis. But some U.S. and U.N. diplomats remained skeptical that the Bush administration would accept the British changes.

The British move comes as U.S. officials have suggested that the United States may abandon the resolution if it cannot muster enough support for its adoption in the 15-nation council.

State Department spokesman Richard Boucher and other U.S. officials said Wednesday that the United States intends to press ahead with plans to introduce a revised resolution, possibly as early as next week, calling for countries to provide more troops and money.

Boucher cautioned that a new resolution would not include any "radical departures" from the version that U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and other council members said failed to assign a strong enough role to the United Nations and the Iraqis in shaping their future.

"We could proceed or not proceed with the resolution. That's definitely one of the options," Boucher told reporters in Washington on Wednesday. "We want to get a resolution, if we can get a resolution that meets our criteria and that helps get international support for the process of political transition that is underway."

A senior Pentagon official for foreign policy, testifying about Iraqi issues on Capitol Hill, indicated that the administration's interest in the resolution is waning.

"It's not moving forward, but we haven't made a decision to abandon it," Peter W. Rodman, assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, told the House Armed Services Committee.

U.S. diplomats say they have little hope that France and Germany -- Security Council members and key European critics of U.S. Iraq policy -- will support the resolution, but they have stepped up efforts to garner backing from Russia and other council members.

They have also privately pressed governments to attend an Iraqi donors' conference in Madrid scheduled for Oct. 23 and 24.

"You may have a lot of people going to Madrid, but just to listen, not to actually pledge anything," said one senior council diplomat whose government has been asked to attend.

Senior Security Council members said that Washington could get a resolution passed, but that it would be insufficient to generate new pledges of troops or money for Iraq. "With small changes, cosmetic changes and pressure in the capitals, they can get nine votes" required for adoption in the council, a council diplomat said. "At the same time, what's the purpose of that?"

L. Paul Bremer, the United States' top civilian administrator in Iraq, has established a multiphase program for Iraqi self-rule, beginning with the drafting of a constitution within six months and culminating in the transfer of full sovereignty to a new Iraqi government following national elections near the end of 2004.

Bush administration officials fear that a faster turnover of power could undermine a fragile political transition, providing an unfair advantage to former Iraqi exiles and other members of the U.S.-approved Governing Council whose popular support is unproven.

Annan, who favors reversing the sequence, believes that a transfer of power to an Iraqi transitional government within five months would enhance security in Iraq and undercut the armed resistance.

He told the council last week that the United Nations would not play the political role envisioned in the U.S. resolution as long as the United States and its military allies exercise political control over Iraq.

The British compromise proposal envisions the immediate establishment of a constitutional process; then the appointment of a provisional government drawn from the ranks of the Governing Council and a preparatory constitutional committee created to draft a constitution; and, finally, national elections.

Staff writers Thomas E. Ricks and Peter Slevin contributed to this report from Washington.