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发帖数: 4174 | 1 WASHINGTON -- Fulfilling a long-held campaign promise, President Barack
Obama will announce Friday that he is pulling all U.S. troops out of Iraq by
the end of the year, as conditioned by the Status of Forces Agreement with
the country.
In confirming that U.S. troops will be out by the end of 2011, the president
will be fulfilling the most memorable pledge he made in securing the
nomination of president from his party. There had been reports the
administration had been plotting ways to renegotiate the Status of Forces
Agreement with the Iraqi government so as to prolong America's presence in
the country. Those rumors heightened concerns among Democrats who backed
Obama in part because of his pledge to end the war in Iraq.
"This will allow us to say definitively that the Iraq war is over, and that
the partnership between the US and Iraq will be a normal one between two
sovereign nations," said a senior White House official.
There are currently 41,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, virtually all of whom will
be pulled by December 31, 2011. At the height of U.S. involvement in 2006,
there were 170,000 soldiers on the ground.
The president is set to speak before the press corps at 12:45 p.m. to
announce his decision. He held a video conference with Iraq Prime Minister
Nouri al-Maliki about an hour before that, in which the topic of a troop
drawdown was discussed.
"During their conversation, President Obama and P.M. Maliki strongly agreed
that this is the best way forward for both countries," the White House
official said.
More than 4,400 American military lives have been lost since the start of
the war in March of 2003, and more than 100,000 Iraqi civilians have been
killed, according to Iraq Body Count, which cross checks news reports with
hospital and other official data. |
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