By IRNA
London : Prime Minister Gordon Brown Wednesday refused to give any commitment about Britain’s future military deployment in Iraq, saying the situation will be reviewed again following the drawdown next spring.
“I am not going to set any artificial timetable” for the withdrawal of remaining British troops following the planned reduction from 4,500 to 2,500 by April 2008, Brown said.
Speaking at his latest regular press conference, he said he would review the situation in spring “where we want to be in future months.” Questioned about the “morality” of last weekend’s transfer of control of Basra to Iraqi authority following criticism that Britain has handed over to armed groups, the British premier acknowledged that “nothing is perfect.”
Over the past few months, there had been a 90 per cent fall in attacks on troops and “less, not more violence,” he said.
The transfer of control of Basra province had already been taken “later than planned” and had the full support of the US, the Iraqi government and British commanders on the ground,” Brown also said.
“We have always said we would move from combat to overwatch with a re-intervention capability,” he said. The role of British troops, he said, was primarily to train Iraq’s own armed forces.
On Monday, Armed Forces Minister Bob Ainsworth was forced to deny that the transfer of control in Basra to Iraqi authorities represented a defeat for British soldiers.
“We have not been forced to retreat,” Ainsworth said after Sunday’s handover following four-and-a-half years of British control.
“We have never denied that the situation in Basra is far from the ideal and nobody is trying to suggest that it is,” he insisted.
Basra’s new police commander, Major General Jalil Khalaf, has criticized Britain’s retreat in the face of the growing power of local militia.
“They left me militia, they left me gangsters, and they left me all the troubles in the world,” Khalaf said.