BAGHDAD, Nov 1: Two US soldiers were killed in northern Iraq on Saturday as President George Bush ruled out a “premature” withdrawal while his overseer in Baghdad vowed to speed up the handover of authority to Iraqis.

Bush said any early pullout of American troops and administrators in the face of the escalating violence in Iraq would only encourage “terrorists” and increase threats to his own country.

“The United States will complete our work in Iraq. Leaving Iraq prematurely would only embolden the terrorists and increase the danger to America. We are determined to stay, to fight and to win,” he said in his weekly radio address.

But after the deadliest week here since Bush declared major combat over on May 1, Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, the top US military commander in Iraq, said the upsurge was “strategically and operationally insignificant”.

America’s overseer Paul Bremer pledged at a Baghdad news conference that the US-led coalition would “seek ways to accelerate the transfer of authority to the government of Iraq”.

“The coalition is still going to turn sovereignty to the Iraqi people as quickly as practicable,” he said.

“On the security front we will accelerate the turnover of responsibility and authority to Iraqis,” Mr Bremer said. “It is essential that they take an essential role in their own defence.”

Mr Bremer also said ousted president Saddam Hussein was alive in Iraq, and that “his capture or his killing is our top priority”.

“We still have no clear indication if Saddam himself is behind these attacks,” he said in reference to the latest bombings and killings. “There is some sign of more control over the attacks on a general and regional level.”

PIPELINE BLOWN UP: A “sabotage” explosion ripped through a gas pipeline on Saturday near Baiji, 225 kilometres north of Baghdad, an oil company official said.