Iraqi governing council meets, but violence continues

The founding of a broadly representative governing council in Iraq has done little to stem the guerilla violence, as another US soldier was killed and six wounded when their convoy was ambushed today.

It followed an apparent failed car bombing overnight at a police station filled with American troops and Iraqi police that left a wrecked car and a headless body lying in the street nearby.

Meanwhile, a group claiming to be an Iraqi branch of the al-Qaida terror network said its members – not Saddam Hussein loyalists – are leading resistance to the coalition forces.

“We warn the American forces to leave Iraq’s territories and to live up to their promises,” a spokesman for the Islamic Armed Group of al-Qaida said in a video screened by al-Arabiya TV.

Amid the warnings, Iraq’s new governing council – which includes Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Christians and ethnic Turks – held its first meeting yesterday.

Among its first moves was to name April 9 – the day Baghdad fell to the Americans – a national holiday, and it banned celebrations on six dates important to Saddam and his Baath Party supporters.

The council will have real political muscle, with the power to name ministers and approve the 2004 budget. But final control of Iraq still rests with US administrator Paul Bremer.

With the American military still struggling with security, setting up the council was a major political step, giving an Iraqi face to the US-led occupation of the country.

Council member Adnan Pachachi, a former foreign minister, said he does not expect Bremer to veto council decisions.

But it remains to be seen whether the council can convince the Iraqi people it represents them, even though they never had a chance to vote for its members. The US says Iraqi elections are not yet practical.

“I helped deliver thousands of Iraqi babies, and now I am taking part in the birth of a new country and a new rule based on women’s rights, humanity, unity and freedom,” said Raja Habib al-Khuzaai, one of the female council members and the director of a maternity hospital in southern Iraq.

Sergio Vieira de Mello, the UN special representative to Iraq, called the day “historic”, and said the country was “moving back to where it rightfully belongs, at peace with itself and a member of the community of nations”.

Ahmad Chalabi, founder of the once-exiled Iraqi National Congress, condemned attacks on American forces in the country.

“The Iraqi people consider them forces of liberation and they do not consider these attacks as acts of resistance,” he said.