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A court yesterday postponed the trial of a journalist who hurled his shoes at US President George W Bush in anger over the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, an act of protest that made him an international celebrity.
The court's decision to review the charges against Muntazer al-Zaidi comes as Iraq prepares after nearly six years to end America's costly grip over the country and give US troops three years to pack up and leave.
The trial of al-Zeidi was to begin today on charges of assaulting a foreign leader, which his defense team said carried a maximum sentence of 15 years. But a spokesman for Iraq's Higher Judicial Council, Abdul-Sattar Bayrkdar, said it was postponed pending an appellate court ruling on whether the charges should be reduced to simply insulting Bush.
Tomorrow will also see the official handover of the most potent symbol of US occupation, when Iraq takes formal control of the Green Zone a heavily fortified enclave surrounded by cement walls that extends over 4 square miles of downtown Baghdad and encompasses the US Embassy and the seat of the Iraqi government.
But in the most telling sign of the changes that are sweeping over Iraq, yesterday's second anniversary of Saddam Hussein's hanging went by almost unnoticed a near-forgotten footnote in a war that has claimed the lives of more than 4,200 Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis. The anniversary was not even marked in Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, where the insurgency quickly took hold after the 2003 US-led invasion. | 
