Hillary Clinton calls for UN return to Iraq

US senators Hillary Clinton and Jack Reed arrived in Iraq yesterday following President George Bush’s surprise visit – and said it was not too late to bring the United Nations back into the country.

As the pair of senators greeted soldiers and top officials of the occupation administration, a US soldier was killed when guerrillas shelled a military base in the northern city of Mosul.

The senators said the administration of Iraq – a huge expense and political burden on the United States – would be made easier with the UN’s stamp of legitimacy and help in transferring power to Iraqis.

Mrs Clinton said: “I’m a big believer that we ought to internationalise this, but it will take a big change in our administration’s thinking. I don’t see that it’s forthcoming.”

Both senators cautioned that new plans to speed up the transfer of power to an Iraqi government are risky given the country’s political and social upheaval.

Mr Reed said a ”critical factor” for coalition authorities was securing the blessing of Iraq’s majority Shiite Muslim community, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, who has criticised the plan.

Al-Sistani, whose opinion is crucial to the success of any political plan in Iraq, has said in recent days he wants an elected Iraqi provisional government instead of one chosen through regional caucuses.

Mr Reed, also a Democrat, said: “We’re caught in a dilemma, possibly of our own making. A quick, hasty election might bring to power a person who doesn’t share the values we’re trying to encourage. But the more we wait, the more it looks like an occupation.”

Mrs Clinton said the main purpose of her trip was to show support for US troops.

“I wanted to come to Iraq to let the troops know about the great job they’re doing,” she said.

Mr Reed, who voted against authorising war against Iraq, said his rationale has been confirmed by his visit, as well as by a trip he made in July.

He said the Bush administration was too hasty in dismissing the UN search for weapons that probably would have shown that Iraq represented no imminent threat to the United States.

He said alleged links between Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida terrorist network and Saddam Hussein also appeared to be exaggerated.

Mrs Clinton supported a resolution granting Mr Bush congressional authority to wage war against Iraq.

A soldier died on Thanksgiving Day from a gunshot wound inside the heavily fortified US base in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad. Military officials refused to describe the circumstances of the shooting.

Another soldier died yesterday when four mortar shells pounded a 101st Airborne Division base in Mosul. Iraqi insurgents have stepped up attacks in previously calm Mosul in recent weeks.

US soldiers in Ramadi shot a seven-year-old Iraqi child in the foot after the child pointed an AK-47 automatic rifle at them, the US military said.

And a US soldier was seriously wounded after a roadside bomb struck a convoy he was travelling in near the town of Samarra, about 75 miles north of Baghdad.

Two other US soldiers were injured when their tank struck a land mine near the Syrian border, the military said.

The military also said it had captured one of Saddam’s former bodyguards, identified as Brigadier General Khalid Arak Hatimy. The statement claimed Hatimy had been inciting the uprising west of Baghdad and providing money and weapons to guerrillas.

More than 60 US troops have been killed in hostile action in November, more than any other month since the end of major combat in Iraq on May 1.

Since operations began, nearly 300 US service members have died from hostile action. Another 136 have died from accidents and other causes. A total of 75 soldiers from allied nations have died.