The U.S. Defense Department says that it's cancelling the deployment ofa 3,500-member Army brigade to Iraq in January, amid "improvingsecurity." Some violence continues, however, such as the explosionSaturday on a key highway bridge linking Iraq to Jordan and Syria.  

TheU.S. Army brigade, based at Fort Drum, New York, had been scheduled toreplace another unit, due to leave Iraq at the start of next year.  

DefenseDepartment officials stressed that the decision was based on securityimprovements and the increasing capabilities of Iraq's own securityforces.

Iraq is due to hold parliamentary elections in January,2010 but ongoing friction between the country's different ethnic andreligious communities is a threat to security and political stabilityin the country.

Sporadic violence, including a suicide bombingattack Saturday on a key bridge linking Iraq with Syria and Jordan,continues to hamper both security and the political process. It was thesecond time that the same bridge, located near the western city ofRamadi, had been targeted in the past two years.

A businessmanin Ramadi complained that the early-morning explosion, which severelydamaged the bridge, was intended to cause chaos by disrupting travel,commerce and trade:

He says that the highway, where the bridgewas blown up, links Iraq with the outside world, and it hasrepercussions on transport, stability and the security situation. Hesaid it also means that goods imported from outside the country will beaffected.

There were also attacks on Saturday west of Baghdad, just outside of Fallujah,  and in the northern city of Mosul.

ProfessorKhattar Abou Diab, who teaches political science at the University ofParis, says that while the security situation in Iraq has improved, ingeneral, it remains fragile and subject to periodic violence:

Hesays that the situation in Iraq at the moment is ambiguous with signsof overall improvement but a definite fragility of security in places,as witnessed by recent explosions, including the destruction of thehighway bridge (Saturday) and the August 19th explosions in Baghdad. Hepoints out that while Iraq's security no longer requires a massivepresence of U.S. and Western troops, much depends on the outcome ofelections in January, and the easing of tensions between Kurds andArabs, Sunnis and Shi'ites, and even within the Shi'ite communityitself. U.S. achievements in Iraq, he argues, are fragile and depend onharmony between Iraqis and a halt to infiltration along Iraq's borders.

Thereare currently 119,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Under a US-Iraq securitypact, signed last November, all U.S. combat troops are due to leave thecountry by August of 2010. Advisors and training forces are scheduledto leave in 2011.