The Hindu : Spanish PM-elect to recall troops in Iraq

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 16, 2004

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Spanish PM-elect to recall troops in Iraq

MADRID, MARCH 15. Moving to fulfil a campaign pledge, the leader of Spain's victorious Socialists said today that he would bring Spanish troops home from Iraq by June 30.

Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero spoke hours after voters ousted the conservative Government, accused of provoking the Madrid railway bombings by backing the Iraq war. The attacks killed 200 people and wounded some 1,500.

``The Spanish troops which are in Iraq will be returning home,'' Mr. Zapatero told Cadena Ser radio. He said the troops would be recalled once he put together a government some time in mid-April and formally took over as Prime Minister.

However, a party spokesman explained to the Associated Press that Mr. Zapatero stuck to his campaign condition that the 1,300 troops would stay if the United Nations assumed control of the peacekeeping operation in Iraq.

In Sunday's general elections, the Socialist Workers' Party defeated the ruling Popular Party, jumping from 125 seats to 164 in the 350-member Congress of Deputies. The conservatives fell from 183 to 148.

The conservatives' defeat was unexpected. Pre-election polls had predicted the Popular Party, led by Mariano Rajoy, would win comfortably. But when the ballots were tallied, the Socialists netted 10.9 million to the PP's 9.6 million. Turnout was 77 per cent.

The circumstances were exceptional. Thursday's train bombing, reportedly claimed by the Al-Qaeda, was followed by demonstrations the next day that drew millions across Spain. Then the Government of Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar was accused of misleading voters by insisting that armed Basque separatists were the prime suspects even as evidence mounted of an Islamic link.

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