British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw Thursday defended the war in Iraq unleashed by the United States and Britain and brushed aside the idea of a timetable for power transfer in post-war Iraq.

While acknowledging the controversy over the military action the United States and Britain took in Iraq, and the heavy responsibilities they now bear, Straw said he firmly believe the decision they took was the right one.

"Saddam Hussein would have been emboldened by our failure to act, every dictator would have been encouraged to follow his example, and the authority of the United Nations would have been gravely weakened," he said.

Straw's remark brought to Washington some welcome support at the assembly, where the US-led war to topple Saddam Hussein has been battered by a new round of criticism from world leaders.

The British foreign secretary urged the international community to move past previous differences and work together to ensure the right and freedom of the Iraqi people.

"Yet whatever the arguments of the spring, we must now come together again for a common purpose. As the Security Council has recognized in three resolutions, 1472, 1483 and 1500, we have a shared interest in helping Iraqi citizens to embrace the rights and freedoms which they had been denied for so long and for which this institution was founded," he added.

Outlining British principles governing power handover in post-war Iraq, Straw said the transfer of power in Iraq must reflect realities on the ground in the country, particularly the need to ensure security.

He also said that the Iraqi institutions must be robust enough before it can take on increasing responsibilities.

The exercise of executive powers and responsibilities must be based on good governance, involving representative Iraqi authorities and coherent constitutional arrangements, he said.

"The timetable should be driven by the needs of the Iraqi people and their capacity progressively to assume democratic control, rather than fixing arbitrary deadlines," Straw said.

This is apparently in response to the French and German call for prompt handover of power to the Iraqis. On Tuesday French President Jacques Chirac reaffirmed his demand for a speedy transfer of sovereignty and governing responsibility to the Iraqis according to a "realistic" timetable and under UN guidance.

Amid strong criticism of the war in Iraq, Bush has so far been unable to get other nations to commit troops to Iraq, where US forces are facing an expensive and deadly guerrilla-style insurgency that has killed more US soldiers than the invasion that brought down Saddam.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan opened the current session Tuesday with a stinging rebuke to US "unilateralism" but added that the United Nations needed major reforms and had failed to find the political will for collective action.
 
(Xinhua News Agency September 26, 2003)