WASHINGTON - The United States expressed hope Thursday that Iraq's political calendar providing for definitive elections by the end of the year would be respected despite delays in forming an interim government.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher played down the arduous process that produced Iraq's first elected government in a half-century after more than two months of squabbling within the new national assembly.
"Yes, people in Iraq have complained and grumbled to some extent about how long it's taken to form the government," Boucher said. "But that's what happens in a democracy. And that's a good thing."
Boucher hailed the installation of Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani as the largely ceremonial president and his naming of Muslim Shiite Ibrahim Jaafari as prime minister as a "historic development" for post-war Iraq.
But the national assembly elected in landmark polls January 30 now faced the equally delicate task of drafting a constitution by August 15 to prepare for new general elections and a definitive government by year's end.
Boucher shrugged off any suggestion the timetable would have to be revised given the protracted negotiations needed to choose an interim government two years after the US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
"The first day of the new presidency is not the day to say that he and the government are not going to achieve their goals set for the end of the year," he said. "They are very, very aware of the tasks before them."
"They have a schedule. Everybody agrees on the importance of meeting that schedule. They know what they have to do. We'll give them every possible support in doing that."
Analysts said the establishment of a new leadership in Baghdad was good political news for the US administration, but Washington still had work to do to shore up the Iraqi government so US troops could start returning home.
"The challenges still to be met by Iraq's emerging leadership during the rest of this year are so daunting as to inspire anxiety in any outside observer," a Washington Post editorial said.
In his acceptance speech, Talabani proposed an amnesty for insurgents battling the US-backed administration. He also held out a hand to Iraq's Sunni minority who dominated the country under Saddam's regime.
While US forces had taken a harder line on pro-Saddam Sunnis, Boucher said Washington officials "were not going to sit around second-guessing" the new Iraqi leadership.
"Our goal was to put this country back in the hands of the Iraqis after many, many years of dictatorship and distortion of their politics and of their rights," he said.
"Now that they have that power to go forward, they're going to make their decisions," he said. "They have to deal with circumstances as they find them. They have to decide how they want their country to go forward."
The political calendar, set by the Transitional Administrative Law adopted during the US occupation of Iraq, calls for a referendum on a new constitution by October 15.
But the speaker of the assembly, backed by a majority of the 275 legislators, can ask before August 1 for a one-time six-month extension of the deadline for drafting the constitution.
If the constitution is approved in time, general elections are to be held by December 15 and a new government installed by December 31.
If the constitution is rejected, a new assembly is to be elected by December 15 and charged with writing a constitution next year.
04/07/2005 19:38 GMT