Italy sets end-of-year deadline for Iraq withdrawal

Italy’s foreign minister today said that all Italian troops would leave Iraq by the end of the year, giving the first official timeframe for a complete pullout by the new centre-left government.

The previous government had also vowed to bring all its forces home by the end of the year.

In Baghdad, foreign minister Massimo D’Alema said Italy would begin reducing the number of Italian troops in Iraq this month and “the Italian military presence in Iraq will end by the end of the year”.

Italy’s decision to pull out its 2,700 troops – the fourth largest contingent of foreign forces behind the US, Britain and South Korea – is the latest blow to the current 26-nation coalition.

South Korea began bringing troops home late last month as part of a plan to withdraw about 1,000 of its 3,200 soldiers from northern Iraq.

The announcement of the timeframe came two days after an attack on an Italian military convoy in southern Iraq that killed a soldier and wounded four others. But D’Alema said it was strictly a political decision.