Bush warns of Iraq violence before vote
(AP)
Updated: 2005-09-29 08:43

US President Bush on Wednesday warned there will be an upsurge in violence in Iraq before next month's voting, but said the terrorists will fail, reported AP.

"Our troops are ready," he said. Bush's remarks in the Rose Garden came a day after Iraqi and U.S. forces announced they had killed Abdullah Abu Azzam, the No. 2 al-Qaida leader in Iraq, during a weekend raid in Baghdad.

"This guy's a brutal killer," Bush said.

Al-Qaida in Iraq issued an Internet statement denying that Abu Azzam was its deputy leader, calling him "one of al-Qaida's many soldiers" and "the leader of one its battalions operating in Baghdad." The U.S.-led coalition, however, called Abu Azzam the mastermind of an escalation in suicide bombings that have killed nearly 700 people in Baghdad since April.

"We can expect they'll do everything in their power to try to stop the march of freedom," Bush said. "And our troops are ready for it."

Bush spoke following a meeting with Gen. George Casey, the top commander in Iraq, and Gen. John Abizaid, the commander of U.S. Central Command. He said he has dispatched the two generals to Capitol Hill to brief members on the war on terrorism and operations in Iraq.

U.S. President George W. Bush makes a statement on the 'War on Terror' in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington September 28, 2005, alongside (2nd L-R) Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Richard Myers, Army General John Abizaid and Army General George Casey. [Reuters]

Bush cited as evidence of the progress he wants lawmakers — and Americans — to see, the killing of the al-Qaida leader, the increasing numbers of Iraqi troops capable of guarding cities and the closing off of a main route for foreign terrorists coming into Iraq from Syria.

But the president's remarks also came on a day when a female suicide bomber blew herself up outside an Iraqi army recruiting center, killing at least six people and wounding 30, in Tal Afar, an area where U.S. and Iraqi forces routed militants in a major offensive two weeks ago. Al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility for the blast.

The president is facing declining public support for the war that has claimed the lives of at least 1,925 members of the U.S. military A weekend anti-war demonstration in Washington drew an estimated 100,000 to the capital and polls show Bush approval rating is at the lowest point of his presidency.

National polls have shown a majority of Americans now believing the war was a mistake. In an AP-Ipsos poll this month, only 37 percent approved or leaned toward approval of how Bush has handled the situation in Iraq; strong disapproval outweighed strong approval by 2-1, 46 percent to 22 percent.

Insurgent attacks have escalated ahead of an Oct. 15 referendum on a new constitution that has raised fears of a bloody sectarian split between Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority and the disaffected Sunni minority.

If two-thirds of voters in any three of Iraq's 18 provinces reject the document on Oct. 15, a new government must be formed and the process of writing the constitution started over.

"As these milestones approach we can expect there to be increasing violence," Bush said.

The Pentagon has announced that about 9,400 active-duty U.S. troops in Iraq who are scheduled to finish one-year tours in January will be kept there an extra seven to 10 days so that a transition to the units replacing them will not begin during the Iraqi election scheduled for December.

There currently are about 147,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Although U.S. officials say they cannot forecast precisely how many they will have in Iraq during the December election period because there is an ongoing rotation of units, the extensions announced Friday appeared to indicate that the number would exceed 150,000.