Democrats: White House overrates Iraq progress

WASHINGTON, July 1 (Xinhua) -- The White House overrated progress in its updated report on Iraq, U.S. Democratic lawmakers said Tuesday.

Congressman Mike McIntyre, a Democrat from North Carolina, said the report used false standards to determine whether satisfactory progress was made in 18 benchmarks set by the Bush administration.

The report, made public Tuesday, rated Iraq's progress in 15 of18 benchmarks as "satisfactory", up from 8 in an earlier report a year ago.

Only two benchmarks, enacting and implementing laws to disarm militias and distribute oil revenues were rated "unsatisfactory."

One benchmark was described as "mixed": the progress of the Iraqi security forces.

But McIntyre and other Democrats said only a few benchmarks has been actually met.

Senator Carl Levin, a Democrat from Michigan, said there is no military solution to the Iraq problem, no matter what White House said about the progress in Iraq.

U.S. President George W. Bush signaled that he will keep most of the current 147,000 U.S. troop in Iraq through the end of his term in January next year.

Whether the United States will speed up withdrawal from Iraq after that depends on results of this year's general election.

Republican presidential contender John McCain said he will fight the war until a complete victory while his Democratic rival Barack Obama promised to start withdrawing troops from Iraq as soon as he takes office of the president.