The US troops currently occupying Iraq will leave the war-torn country once the newly-installed Iraqi transitional authority can take over security itself in all aspects, US Central Command Chief Gen. John Abizaid said in Baghdad Tuesday.  

"The American military presence in Iraq will no longer be needed at the point where the Iraqi government assumes responsibility for its external and internal security," Abizaid told a joint press conference with US civil administrator Paul Bremer.

"It doesn't mean we will rush out. It means that we will, in a careful and in a certain manner, train, provide for Iraqi security forces to be responsible," he added.

But the general shunned the question about the possibility of maintaining US military bases in Iraq after an expected power handover next summer.

Earlier reports said the US army could set up four bases across Iraq, namely in the capital city of Baghdad, Mosul in the north, Nasiriya in central south and Basra in the south.

The US-installed Iraqi Governing Council has unveiled and presented to the UN Security Council a new political transformation blueprint, which sees the end of occupation by June next year.

But the plan did not contain clear description of when the US-led coalition troops shall withdraw and how the security task will be shared.

Bremer said the process of transferring security file will be discussed in the coming period.

(Xinhua News Agency November 26, 2003)