The United States has circulated among members of the United Nations Security Council a third revised draft resolution on Iraq, requesting the Iraqi Governing Council to provide by Dec. 15 a timetable for the return of the Iraqi sovereignty, informed diplomatic sources said on Sunday.

The resolution would regard the governing council and its ministers as "the principal body of the Iraqi interim administration which will embody the sovereignty of the state of Iraq during the transitional period," said the sources.

The US-installed governing council would be invited to present to the Security Council, "no later than Dec. 15," a timetable and a program for the drafting of a new constitution for Iraq and for the holding of the democratic elections under the constitution, they said.

The new version came out after the second amended draft, which was distributed by Washington on Oct. 1, met harsh criticism from United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

Annan, supported by France, Russia and other Security Council members, calls for turning over, within few months, the Iraqi sovereignty to an interim government and then starting the constitutional process and the electoral process.

Annan hopes that a quick transfer of the sovereignty could effectively reduce Iraqi resistance and allow the United Nations to play a role in Iraq's political process in a relatively secure environment.

It seems that the latest US version has not yet gone as far as Annan and other opponents want.

(Xinhua News Agency October 13, 2003)