Iraq: 3000 Italian troops out by end of year

iht: Italy will withdraw its nearly 3,000 troops from Iraq by the year's end, the defense minister said Thursday during a fiercely fought general election in a nation where the Iraq war is not popular.

"This is not a retreat, a word that is not part of our vocabulary," the minister, Antonio Martino, told a parliamentary commission. Rather, he called it a "dignified and just return." Read more