UNITED NATIONS, April 12: The State Department has invited UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s special adviser on Iraq to Washington for talks on the post-Iraq war scenario, the United Nations officials said on Friday.

UN spokesman Fred Eckhard told reporters on Friday that Mr Rafeeuddin Ahmed was invited to Washington on Monday for a series of briefings involving officials from the US State Department, the Defence Department and the national security council of the White House.

Mr Annan said the United Nations should play a key role in the reconstruction of Iraq after the fighting has ended, but the US officials had been resisting spelling out precisely what that role might be.

“I do expect the UN to play an important role. Above all, the UN involvement does bring legitimacy, which is necessary for the country, for the region and for the peoples around the world,” Mr Annan said on Thursday.

Rafeeuddin Ahmed, a retired UN official from Pakistan, was selected by Mr Annan on Thursday last as his special adviser on Iraq.

He has presided over a group that drew up contingency plans earlier this year on a UN role in helping to forge an interim Iraqi administration.

It is learnt that the plans, which are not being disclosed, reject a full-scale UN administration as in Kosovo or in East Timor as well as any responsibility for security except for the eventual training of police.

Britain has outlined a plan, calling for the UN political role to last about a year, compared to a significantly longer period in Afghanistan, diplomats said.

But the Bush administration officials have made it clear that Washington would decide the future of Iraq.

They have deliberately stayed away from committing to any UN involvement that would mean approval by a Security Council.

That would leave the United Nations advisory functions and possible responsibilities in the areas of humanitarian relief and protecting human rights.