BAGHDAD, Jan 25: Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi on Tuesday outlined plans for Iraqi forces gradually to take over security from US-led troops if he stays in power, but he refused to set a date for their exit from the country.
"I promise you I will build a strong Iraqi force, able to take full responsibility for Iraq's security and its citizens," Mr Allawi told reporters less than a week before Iraq's elections.
"Others talk about the immediate withdrawal of the multinational forces or setting fixed dates for them to leave. I promise you I will not deal with the security issue under any political pretext or bargain with the interests of the Iraqi people."
He has said US-led forces will remain until Iraq's fledgling security forces are able to take over. Iraq's army and police have borne the brunt of attacks by insurgents who accuse them of collaborating with foreign troops they want to push off Iraqi soil.
Most of the political parties contesting the Jan 30 poll, the first multi-party vote in 50 years, have promised to set a timeline for the withdrawal of US-led troops.
The Muslim Clerics' Association, an influential group of Sunni religious leaders, said this month it would call off its boycott of the elections if Washington agreed to a timeline.
A US embassy official said at the time the Bush administration had no intention of setting a withdrawal date. Mr Allawi, a Shia politician appointed interim prime minister in June when Washington formally returned sovereignty to Iraq, is leading a secular alliance in the election.
JUDGE KILLED: Gunmen shot dead a senior Iraqi judge and his brother-in-law on Tuesday and then danced in the street, shouting "This is what will happen to the traitor Shias", one of the dead man's colleagues told AFP.
The assailants, driving an Opel car, cut off Judge Qaiss Hashem al-Shamari, 32, the secretary of Iraq's council of judges, who was driving with his brother-in-law, and shot them dead, Shamari's fellow judge told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Shamari's colleague had earlier said the judge's son was in the car, but later corrected himself after receiving the latest report from the justice and interior ministries about the shooting in eastern Baghdad.
"When they shot them, they jumped out of the car and started shouting 'this is what will happen to the traitor Shias," Shamari's colleague said. Shamari served as the chief administrator on the council of judges, the legal body that supervises all of Iraq's courts.
The governor of Baghdad and the capital's deputy police chief were gunned down earlier this month as insurgents escalated their efforts to sabotage next Sunday's national election.
In an audiotape message posted on an Islamist website last Sunday, militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - the most wanted man in Iraq with a 25 million dollar price on his head - declared all-out war on the elections he considers un-Islamic and also singled out the country's Shias, who form 60 per cent of Iraq's population Zarqawi said the Jan 30 polls were a "wicked trap aimed at putting the Rafidha (a derogatory term for Shias) in the seat of power in Iraq."
VIDEOTAPE: Al-Jazeera television aired a videotape on Tuesday showing what it said was a US hostage who allegedly worked for American forces in Iraq urging Arab leaders to secure his release.
The bearded man, wearing a black and cream coloured shirt, was identified by the Qatar-based news channel as Roy Hallums. The name corresponded to that of an American who was abducted in Iraq last November 1.
One of Hallums' two daughters, who lives in the US state of California, has created a website in his name (at http://royhallums.4t.com) in which the family appeals for help to secure his release.
Hallum appealed to Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, to help free him, Al-Jazeera said, its announcer speaking over the man's statement. -Reuters / AFP
