President Barack Obama has asked Vice President Joe Biden to take on the new role overseeing the US departure from Iraq and Washington's effort to promote internal political reconciliation there.
The White House said yesterday that Biden would work closely with General Ray Odierno, the top US commander in Iraq and US ambassador to Baghdad Christopher Hill as US forces prefer to leave for good by the end of 2011.
"The vice president has been asked by the president to oversee the policy," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.
Biden would work with Iraqis "toward overcoming their political differences and achieving the type of reconciliation that we all understand has yet to fully take place but needs to take place."
"Given his knowledge of the region, the number of times he's been there, he's perfectly suited for this type of role," Gibbs said.
Biden, who was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee before becoming vice president, has made repeated trips to Iraq, and is playing a similar role overseeing a $787 billion economic stimulus package.
Gibbs said that an idea once put forward by Biden, of dividing Iraq's Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish communities into a federation of autonomous zones, was not on the table for the Obama administration.
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