BAGHDAD, Iraq — Three months after the fall of Saddam Hussein, 25 prominent Iraqis from a variety of political, ethnic and religious backgrounds stepped onto a stage on Sunday and declared themselves the first interim government of Iraq.

In Washington, meanwhile, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld acknowledged it's not going to be a peaceful summer in Iraq for U.S. forces and that the administration does not know how long the occupation will last or how much it ultimately will cost.

The members of the Governing Council said they would begin meeting in continuous session today to decide on a rotating presidency or a similar leadership structure. As its first act on Sunday, the council abolished six national holidays that had been celebrated under Saddam's 24-year rule and it created a new national day.

Two of the banned holidays were fast approaching, adding to the urgency of forming a government, Iraqis said. July 14 is the anniversary of the 1958 overthrow of the monarchy, and July 17 is the anniversary of the 1968 coup that brought Saddam's Baath Party to power.

In their place, the council declared April 9, the day that Baghdad fell to allied forces as Saddam went into hiding, to be the national day of a new Iraqi state. That state will not emerge until the interim government decides on a process for writing a new constitution and for holding the first democratic elections. No timetable for either task has been set.

Iyad Alawi, leader of the Iraqi National Accord and a member of the council, said the first priority of the government "will be security and the resumption of services."

American and coalition troops have been the target of daily sniper shootings, rocket-propelled grenades and other attacks. Since May 1, when President Bush declared major combat over, 31 U.S. soldiers have been killed and scores wounded in hit-and-run attacks.

"I'm afraid we're going to have to expect this to go on," Rumsfeld said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"And there's even speculation that during the month of July, which is an anniversary for a lot of Baathist events, we could see an increase in the number of attacks," he said.

The defense secretary declined to use the term "guerrilla war" to describe the situation on the ground.

He said there is still a lot of debate about whether the resistance American forces are encountering is organized throughout the country. However, he said, "It's very clear that it's coordinated in regions and areas, cities in the north particularly."

Rumsfeld also disputed claims from some congressional Democrats that the administration has understated the cost of the war and occupation of Iraq.

"We have said we don't know what it will cost. We have said it's not knowable how long it will last," he said on ABC's "This Week."

Rumsfeld said estimates he provided Congress last week that the occupation was costing $3.9 billion to $4 billion a month are based on current costs and cannot be projected into the future.

There are about 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Rumsfeld would only say that they may be there for the "foreseeable future," and he said that number could be increased, if that is what is needed.

The U.S. Army, meanwhile, stepped up pressure on pro-Saddam Hussein holdouts Sunday with a fourth large offensive in central Iraq.

At least four suspected loyalists were killed, and big weapons caches were captured in the operation, called Ivy Serpent, which aims to blunt potential anti-American attacks ahead of now-banned holidays of Saddam's Baath Party.

The military said one soldier was killed and two others injured early Sunday when a tractor trailer crashed accidentally into their vehicle, parked at a checkpoint outside a base in Diwaniyah, 100 miles south of Baghdad. The names of the soldiers were withheld pending family notification.

The new Iraqi governing council was selected through negotiations between the main Iraqi opposition groups and the office of L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. civilian administrator for the occupation.

"We hope sometime next week to have declarations on security that will comfort the Iraqi people," he said without elaborating. Some Iraqis are pressing the U.S. military to form a paramilitary force of Iraqis immediately to help defeat the remnants of Saddam's security forces that are believed to be involved in attacks on American soldiers.

The formation of the government took place under heavy security by U.S. soldiers, who have cordoned off a broad section of central Baghdad that includes Saddam's Republican Palace and the convention center where Sunday's ceremony took place.

The Iraqis met privately for two hours and then had lunch with the Western overseers of the occupation — Bremer, appointed by President Bush, and John Sawers, appointed by Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain — and Sergio Vieira de Mello, the U.N. representative, and other senior U.S. and British officials.

When the 25 emerged for a news conference, two wore the black turbans of Shiite Islamic clerics descended from the Prophet Muhammad and two wore the flowing robes and headdresses of tribal sheiks. Three women were among them, two in head scarves and one without. The rest, men of various political stripes, wore business suits.

View Comments

They arranged themselves in a semicircle as one of the clerics, the elderly Sayyed Muhammad Bahr al-Uloum, read a one-page statement, saying, "The establishment of this council is an expression of the national Iraqi will in the wake of the collapse of the former oppressive regime."

The occupation leaders looked up at them from the front row in the convention center hall. During weeks of negotiations, they agreed to cede considerable executive powers to Iraqis after initially resisting anything greater than an advisory role.

Now, the 25 Iraqis — doctors, lawyers, teachers, engineers, clerics, diplomats, political activists, businessmen and a judge — will share responsibility for the course of Iraq.


Contributing: Associated Press

Join the Conversation
Looking for comments?
Find comments in their new home! Click the buttons at the top or within the article to view them — or use the button below for quick access.