Obama focuses on U.S. troop levels in Iraq

By Dean Yates and Wisam Mohammed

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama met Iraqi leaders and U.S. military commanders in Baghdad on Monday in a visit overshadowed by the question of when U.S. troops should go home.

U.S. strategy in Iraq and troop levels are central issues in the November election race between the first-term senator from Illinois and Republican candidate John McCain.

Obama, who has made his opposition to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq five years ago a centrepiece of his campaign, was in Baghdad to assess security in Iraq, where violence has fallen to its lowest level since early 2004.

Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said Obama did not mention his pledge to remove U.S. combat troops within 16 months if he takes office in talks with Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

But in comments suggesting Iraq and Obama are not far apart on the timeframe, Dabbagh said Baghdad's goal was for foreign combat forces to leave by the end of 2010 if security conditions allowed. Dabbagh has floated a similar timeframe before.

"We cannot give any timetables or dates but the Iraqi government believes the end of 2010 is the appropriate time for the withdrawal of the forces," Dabbagh told reporters.

On Sunday, Dabbagh denied Maliki had told a German magazine in an interview that he backed Obama's troop withdrawal timeframe. Dabbagh had said no government statement should be seen as support for either U.S. presidential candidate.

At the White House, spokeswoman Dana Perino was peppered with questions about the Iraqi position on timeframes.

"Do I believe that they have aspirations to have American troops leave sooner than later? Yes. But I also believe that they know that they're ... not going to put an arbitrary date on it which would not be based on conditions," she said.

Maliki told Obama he did not want foreign troops in Iraq for an undefined period but that conditions on the ground would dictate their withdrawal, the Iraqi leader's office said.

"The prime minister said ... objective circumstances would determine the issue of the presence of foreign forces in Iraq, without leaving this open-end," it said in a statement.

Obama has scheduled no news conferences in Iraq.

IRAQ VP CAUTIOUS ON WITHDRAWAL

Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, a Sunni Arab, said he told Obama that while he agreed with a withdrawal timetable in principle Iraq's forces needed to be ready. There are more than 140,000 American troops in Iraq.

"What about a security vacuum? What about upgrading the capacity of the Iraqi armed forces? ... We have to look at all these requirements," Hashemi told reporters.