The US administration is locked in a deepening dispute with the leader of Iraq's American-installed interim government -- Ahmad Chalabi -- over a timetable for self rule, adding yet another complication for US efforts to rebuild the country.
US officials thus far have rebuffed an appeal by Chalabi, the president of the 25-member Iraqi Governing Council, for the US to relinquish control to Iraqis sooner rather than later.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told a Senate hearing on Wednesday that the plan was to turn Iraq back over to its people under a seven-point plan "through a constitution and elections and then passing of sovereignty at a pace as rapidly as is reasonable."
PHOTO: AP
In other words, the administration doesn't intend to turn over the reins of power to an unelected council -- even if it created the council.
But Chalabi, a longtime ally of conservatives at the US Defense Department and in Congress, and several other Iraqi leaders who also owe their posts to the US are expected to make their case directly to Capitol Hill.
Chalabi on Wednesday denied there was a rift between the council and Washington. "We have no disagreement with the United States government," he told a news conference at the UN. "We are not at odds with the US We are working to achieve the common objectives."
The delegation of Iraqi officials attending this week's UN General Assembly session will head to the US capital next to meet with House and Senate members. Their aim: more autonomy for the council and at least partial control immediately of the finance and security ministries.
They plan to argue that turning over power soon could save American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars.
Paul Bremer, the top US administrator in Iraq, says the process must be an orderly one.
"The only path to full Iraqi sovereignty is through a written constitution, ratified and followed by free, democratic elections," he told a congressional hearing.
Republican Senator Sam Brownback, a longtime supporter of Chalabi, said the leader has been one to push against US policy but not one to undermine it.
"That's been the way he's operated in the past," said Brownback, who plans to meet with Chalabi next week. He said he'll listen carefully to Chalabi's appeal.
But Brownback said it would be a serious mistake to pull US forces out of Iraq too quickly.
Chalabi listened Tuesday as President George W. Bush suggested that Iraqi self-government should not be rushed and more nations should share the peacekeeping burden.
The process should be "neither hurried nor delayed by the wishes of other parties," Bush said in a slap primarily at France and Germany, which want a quick turnover of control, and an expanded role for the UN.
Chalabi and his colleagues want to hasten the day when the US relinquishes control -- but don't want to see an expanded UN role or additional foreign troops.
Kurt Campbell, a former top Defense Department official, said the rift is the latest manifestation of an internal feud between the Defense and the State departments.
Powerful Defense officials would like to see Chalabi given more power and basically agree with his recent statements, while the State Department continues to favor a more deliberative process that brings in other nations, Campbell said.
Ivo Daalder, co-author of a book on Bush's foreign policy, said the split is putting the administration in an embarrassing position.
The Iraqi authorities are "not legitimate because we installed them," Daalder said. "And so we now have a problem of going against the people we put in power, saying they can't be trusted."
Support for Chalabi in Iraq is mixed. He has many critics opposed to anyone ruling Iraq who has spent most of his life abroad. Chalabi, 58, left Iraq as a teenager.
A former banker, Chalabi founded the once-exiled Iraqi National Congress and was convicted of fraud in absentia in Jordan in 1992 in a banking scandal and sentenced to 22 years in jail. He has repeatedly denied the charges.
Chalabi is president for September. The council presidency rotates among nine members.
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