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Dubai: Stressing that Islamic efforts must unite to defend the interest of Iraq, the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) has demanded that US troops should pull out of Baghdad as early as possible.

"Islamic efforts must unite to defend Iraq's interests and ... insist on the need for the departure of foreign forces from Iraq as soon as possible," OIC Secretary General Abdulwahed Belkeziz told the opening session of a meeting of senior employees of the 57-nation pan- Islamic body at its headquarters in Jeddah, reports here said.

He said OIC member states should have a major input in defending the rights of the Iraqi people.

Referring to the country's oil wealth, he said, "The Iraqi people must govern themselves ... Iraq's natural resources belong to the Iraqi people alone, who are fully entitled to manage and exploit them according to their interests."

Belkeziz said the United Nations should have the central role in running Iraqi internal and external affairs in the transitional period, as well as a vital role in all arrangements pertaining to the exploitation of its natural resources.

PTI