Iraq withdrawal: Obama's plan leaves McCain in precarious position
Is Nouri al-Maliki taking sides in the US presidential elections?
July 21, 2008 12:24 PM
The Barack Obama camp must be delighted: a German newspaper is sticking to its story that the Iraqi prime minister is backing the Democratic presidential candidate's timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq - a stance that embarrasses the Bush administration and scuppers John McCain's line.

The row about what Nouri al-Maliki said to Der Speigel is going Obama's way and creating the perfect backdrop to a world tour designed to boost his foreign policy credentials.

The Iraqi prime minister was quoted on Saturday as saying: "Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal."

This clearly annoyed the Bush administration, which has repeatedly refused to set out a timetable for withdrawal and described such an exercise as arbitrary.

But last week, Bush moved closer to Obama's line by agreeing with Maliki to the vaguer "general time horizon" for withdrawing troops.

more:http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/news/2008/07/i...