U.S. May Cede Legal Custody Of Hussein

If Iraqi officials do not ask for custody or if the U.S. government rejects the request, U.S. officials insisted that there was sufficient legal basis to hold Iraqis they classify as security detainees or prisoners of war after June 30. An agreement between the interim Iraqi leadership and U.S. officials, approved by the United Nations, expressly gives U.S.-led forces the right to detain people after June 30, they noted. Bremer also maintained that prisoners of war "can be kept until the hostilities are ended, and that isn't going to be by June 30."

The military plans to hold between 3,500 and 4,500 security detainees after the June 30 turnover, officers said. So far, about 400 cases have been turned over to a special Iraqi court established last summer by the occupation authority to try security detainees, although fewer than 20 cases have gone to trial.

Addressing another touchy issue between the U.S. and interim Iraqi governments, Yawar asserted that the United States would not be allowed to keep Hussein's main palace, now used as the occupation headquarters, as part of the future U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

"We have asked that the Republican Palace be vacated at the fastest opportunity for us to use it as Iraqis, as a Republican Palace or a museum. Whatever we do with it is a matter for Iraqi sovereignty. It is a symbol of Iraqi sovereignty," Yawar told reporters.

Meanwhile, insurgents stepped up their campaign against Iraq's infrastructure Tuesday, blasting two oil pipelines and cutting the country's oil exports through the Persian Gulf by half, the Associated Press reported.

Iraqi officials told Dow Jones Newswires they expected to have the damage repaired within a few days. However, petroleum analyst Paul Horsnell, head of energy research at Barclays Capital in London, said that Iraq would probably fail to meet its export target of 2 million barrels a day for June because of the blasts.

[On Wednesday, the al-Jazeera satellite television network reported that the head of security for oil fields in the northern city of Kirkuk had been assassinated, the Reuters news agency reported.]

On Tuesday in Baghdad, a three-vehicle convoy of foreign contract workers employed by the occupation authority was fired as it drove down a street and passed under a bridge, the U.S. military reported. [On Wednesday, the U.S. military announced that two people were killed and three were wounded in the attack, according to the AP.]

Staff writer Jackie Spinner contributed to this report.