BAGHDAD: The US Marine Corps today wrapped up its role in Iraq, handing over duties to the Army and signaling the beginning of an accelerated withdrawal of American troops as the US turns its focus away from the waning Iraqi war to a growing one in Afghanistan.

The Marines were set to formally hand control of Sunni-dominated Anbar, Iraq’s largest province, to the Army during a ceremony at a base in Ramadi - where some of the fiercest fighting of the war took place.

If all goes as planned, the last remaining Marines will be followed out by tens of thousands of soldiers in the coming months.

President Barack Obama has ordered all but 50,000 troops

out of the country by August 31, 2010, with most to leave after

the March 7 parliamentary

election. The remaining troops will leave by the end of 2011 under a US-Iraqi security pact.

But concerns about the success of the election - and perhaps the loss of hard won security gains that the Marines helped cement - are on the rise because of a growing political dispute that could see more than 500 candidates blacklisted because of suspected ties to Saddam Hussein’s regime.