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December 27, 2005
Poland To Reduce Force Size, But Keep Troops In Iraq
Anyone think Howard Dean and John Kerry will praise Bush for his diplomacy?
Poland's two-month-old government plans to keep soldiers in Iraq next year, countering the previous government's pledge to pull out of the U.S.-led operation by this week.
The government asked Polish President Lech Kaczynski, the head of the army, to approve the plan to prolong the eastern European country's military mission in Iraq.
``Our plan is determined by the United Nations prolonging its mission in Iraq and requests from the Iraqi government, which asked us to keep our forces there longer,'' Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz said at a press conference in Warsaw.
About three-quarter of Poles oppose the country's participation in the military occupation of Iraq, according to a June survey for the Warsaw-based Center for Public Research. ...
Poland plans to reduce its contingent to 900 soldiers in March from 1,400 now and then cut the number of soldiers stationed there ``gradually'' until a decision is made to withdraw them completely, General Stanislaw Koziej said at the press conference.