Iraq hopes to end Baghdad security plan soon

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BAGHDAD, Nov 12 (Reuters): Iraq's government hopes it will soon be able to declare an end to a US-Iraqi security operation in Baghdad following a sharp drop in insurgent attacks in the capital, a military spokesman said Brigadier-General Qassim Moussawi, Iraqi spokesman for the nine-month-old. Baghdad security plan, said the decline in violence would allow the government to reopen 10 roads this month that had been closed for security reasons.
"This will help reduce traffic jams and citizens will feel life returning to normal," Moussawi said in an interview with Iraqi state television that was aired around midnight on Sunday.
Asked when the Baghdad offensive, called Operation Imposing Law, would come to an end, Moussawi said: "God willing, soon."
Moussawi did not suggest that would mark an end to joint military offensives in Baghdad.
Declaring an end to Operation Imposing Law would acknowledge that security has improved but would be largely symbolic, as tens of thousands of US and Iraqi troops are likely to remain in the capital.
Iraq launched Operation Imposing Law in mid-February in a last-ditch attempt to halt the country's slide into civil war.
US President George W. Bush sent an extra 30,000 troops to Iraq to beef up the Iraqi government's own forces, with most of the additional American troops deployed in and around Baghdad.
When the offensive began, Iraq was gripped by dozens of bombing and shooting attacks nearly every day. Since American reinforcements were fully deployed in the middle of the year, attacks have fallen sharply.
Moussawi said the Baghdad Sunni district of Adhamiya, once one of the most violent in the capital, recorded 29 insurgent attacks in September, down from a peak of 150 in April.
In the city centre, attacks in September fell to 18 from their highest monthly figure of 187, while in the Shi'ite stronghold of Sadr City, attacks dropped to four in September from a peak of 70. Moussawi did not say which months had seen the most attacks in the latter two cases.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said the drop in violence was a sign sectarian bloodshed in Baghdad was ending.