LONDON, Nov 24: French President Jacques Chirac said on Monday the US moves to speed up the transfer of power to Iraqis were “insufficient and incomplete”.

“The new plan our American friends seem to have adopted over the transfer of sovereignty and responsibility to the Iraqi people seems good in every respect,” Mr Chirac told reporters after a Franco-British summit in London.

“Nevertheless it seems to have taken too long and seems to me relatively incomplete,” President Chirac said, judging that the “UN role has not been explained or had been insufficiently explained”.

“We are heading in the right direction but it is insufficient and incomplete,” Mr Chirac said.

The US timetable calls for indirect elections for a provisional Iraqi assembly by May 31. That body would elect a transitional government by June 30, with elections for a permanent government hoped for by the end of 2005.

The French president met British Prime Minister Tony Blair as the two leaders tried to repair a relationship severely strained by the US-led invasion of Iraq.

Although the two leaders attempted to display a united front, differences over Iraq’s transition to democracy and plans for a European Union defence force took the gloss off the event.

COMMUNIQUE: In a joint communique, the two leaders said the EU should be willing and able to deploy “credible battlegroup-sized forces” of around 1,500 troops in an autonomous operation within 15 days in response to a crisis.—AFP/Reuters