France believed that offering a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops would show "that the goal of the international community was to restore Iraq's sovereignty," said French Deputy Ambassador Jean-Pierre Lacroix.

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The vote on the US-drafted resolution came two weeks after al-Maliki wrote the council to assure it that Baghdad's goal was eventually to assume responsibility for recruiting, training and arming its security forces, taking over these forces' command and control, and assuming responsibility for apprehending and detaining criminals.

Earlier Security Council resolutions authorized the multinational force to arrest and detain prisoners in US facilities including the infamous Abu Ghraib prison, even after the US-led occupation ended on June 30, 2004.

Without council renewal, the multinational force's current mandate would have expired at the end of 2006.

The resolution authorizes the Iraqi government to terminate the force's mandate at any time over the next year if it so chooses.

The measure also renews for a year the International Monitoring and Advisory Board, a UN watchdog set up by the council in 2003 to monitor the use of Iraq's oil wealth.

Iraq initially decided to abolish the board at the end of this year but reversed its decision at the request of governments donating money to Iraqi reconstruction, said Baghdad's deputy UN ambassador, Feisal Amin al-Istrabadi.

Iraq's oil sector has been plagued by sabotage and poor maintenance, and the IAMB has made clear it also suffers from mismanagement, smuggling and official corruption.

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