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US announces 12,000 troops to leave Iraq by Sept

(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-03-08 20:39

BAGHDAD -- The US military has announced that 12,000 American and 4,000 British troops will leave Iraq by September.

Relatives carry a coffin with a body of a policeman killed in a suicide bombing outside the police academy in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, March 8, 2009. [Agencies]

Related readings:  US troops to be fully out of Iraq by 2011  US troops to leave Iraq next Aug  Obama adds 17,000 US troops to Afghanistan

Maj. Gen. David Perkins says that will reduce US combat power from 14 brigades to 12 brigades. He also said Sunday that the US is turning over more facilities to the Iraqi military as part of the drawdown.

President Barack Obama has decided to remove all combat troops by the end of August 2010 with all troops gone by the end of 2011. The 4,000 British troops due to leave are the last British soldiers in Iraq.

There are currently about 135,000 US troops in Iraq.