US draft 'falls short' on Iraq

France, Russia and Germany have signalled that a new US draft resolution on Iraq does not meet their demands.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has also said it did not follow his recommendation for a quick transfer of power to a provisional Iraqi government.

However the revised resolution has won support from Britain, which signed on as a co-sponsor. There was also a sympathetic response from Bulgaria and Spain.

The revised resolution endorses a step-by-step transfer of authority to an Iraqi interim administration but sets no timetable for the handover of sovereignty and leaves the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority in overall control until elections are held at some future unspecified date.

It also calls for a strengthened UN role in helping Iraq's political transition, along with the coalition.

"Obviously, it's not going in the direction I had recommended, but I will still have to study it further," Annan said.

He told the 15 Security Council ambassadors at a private lunch later that the United Nations could not participate properly because the resolution blurred the roles of the United Nations and the coalition, council diplomats said.

Either the coalition or the United Nations should lead the process, Annan told the members, but the best solution would be for a provisional Iraqi government to be installed quickly .

France, Germany and Russia have joined Annan in calling for a quick transfer of sovereignty to Iraqis, with French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin saying it could be done by year's end.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the Iraqi people remain suspicious of the US-led occupying forces.

Iraqis "have more confidence in that country's traditional partners than in some who are controlling the country today," Putin told a World Economic Forum in Moscow.

Russia has expressed a willingness to work with the United States in the country's reconstruction effort.