WASHINGTON (AFP) - Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards called Wednesday for pulling US troops out of Iraq by the end of the year, in the first major foreign policy statement of his campaign.

The former senator, speaking on the NBC television network, discussed a proposal to withdraw 40,000 to 50,000 troops immediately and the rest of the US forces by the end of 2007.

"The Congress needs to stand the ground against this president and force a change in policy" in Iraq, Edwards said.

"I think what the American people wanted them to do was stand their ground, force this president to start withdrawing troops from Iraq."

Hundreds of people have been dying each week in insurgent violence there and more than 3,400 US soldiers have been killed since the US-led invasion in 2003.

Edwards was due to present his proposals later Wednesday in a major speech to the independent foreign policy think tank, the Council on Foreign Relations.

He reiterated his calls for legislation forcing a timeline for withdrawing the troops. Legislation with that provision stalled in Congress Tuesday when majority Democrats shelved a bill making a large war funding package conditional on a withdrawal of US troops by next year.

Instead Democrats accepted a bill which would not pull out US forces, but which sets political and security benchmarks for the Iraqi government -- measures which Edwards also backed.

"All of this doesn't depend on us, it depends on the Iraqis, it depends on what the Sunnis and the Shia leadership do," Edwards said Wednesday.

"If they can reach some political reconciliation ... that will help squelch the violence."

"And the question is, how do we shift the responsibility to them to reach a political solution?" he added.

President "George Bush has shown over and over again that he's stubborn, that he's bull-headed, he doesn't think he can do anything wrong. He will not change unless the Congress forces him to do it."

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