Iraqi police overhaul proposed

WASHINGTON - An independent commission established by Congress to assess Iraq's security forces will recommend remaking the 26,000-member national police force to purge it of corrupt officers and Shi'ite militants suspected of complicity in sectarian killings, Bush administration and military officials said yesterday.

The commission, headed by General James L. Jones, the former top US commander in Europe, concludes that the rampant sectarianism that has existed since the formation of the police force requires that its current units "be scrapped" and reshaped into a smaller, more elite organization, according to one senior official familiar with the findings.

The report, which will be presented to Congress next week, is among a slew of new Iraq assessments - including a national intelligence estimate and a General Accountability Office report - that await lawmakers when they return from summer recess.

Its indictment of a key institution in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government is likely to be seized on by Democrats in Congress and other critics of the administration's Iraq strategy as further evidence that a fundamental shift in US policy is required.

However, a new attempt to disband an Iraqi force would also be risky, given the armed backlash that followed the US decision to dissolve the Iraqi Army soon after the invasion of 2003. Bush administration officials were briefed on the report this week, and they said yesterday that they were studying its recommendations.

Geoff Morrell, a spokesman for Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, said a US effort to retrain the Iraqi police forces was underway.

Morrell said Pentagon officials believe sectarianism could be removed from the ranks without a complete overhaul of the Iraqi force.