Portugal to reassess Iraq mission after June transfer date

LISBON (AFP) May 13, 2004
Portugal will reevaluate the continuation of its national guard contingent in Iraq after the planned June 30 handover of sovereignty to Iraqis, Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso said Thursday.

"What we plan to do in June, when a new government takes over in Iraq, is reevaluate the situation," he told reporters when asked about the mission.

"We want to get to know the way of thinking of the new Iraqi authorities, but that obviously can only be done after that government exists, not before."

On Tuesday Interior Minister Antonio Figueiredo Lopes said Portugal would keep its national guard mission in Iraq for another six months.

Lisbon dispatched 128 national guards, a militarized police force, to Iraq on November 12 to serve as part of a multinational force providing security in the southern city of Nasiriyah under British command.

Durao Barroso has been under growing pressure at home to withdraw the guards from Iraq since Spain's new government announced in March it would withdraw its troops from the war-ravaged country.

Nearly three out of four Portuguese, or 71 percent, want the national guards to be withdrawn, a poll published last month found.

WAR.WIRE