House votes to handcuff Bush on war funds

The House of Representatives voted by 221 votes to 205 to release 43 billion dollars (32 billion euros) in emergency war funds, but told Bush he must show progress in Iraq in July, before collecting another 53 billion dollars in financing.

"This legislation ends the blank check for the president's war without end," Democratic House speaker Nancy Pelosi said.

Bush "has grown accustomed to the free hand on Iraq he had before January 4. Those days are over," she added.

The legislation now moves to the more closely divided Senate, where the split financing component appears unlikely to survive, lining up an intense round of legislative bartering over the bill Bush will be asked to sign.

The Democrat-led House had earlier rejected a largely symbolic bid by the majority party's anti-war block to get troops out of Iraq within six months of enactment.

Under-fire Bush earlier fought back hard, after Democrats gleefully pounced on signs of softening Republican backing for his last-ditch bid to surge nearly 30,000 more troops into war-scarred Iraq.

"I'll veto the bill if it is this haphazard, piecemeal funding, and I made that clear," he said after visiting the Defence Department.

Even if Bush vetoes it, the measure sets out the House's bargaining position for the final war-funding bill, which must be worked out with the Senate and the White House. All parties hope to strike a deal on final terms by the end of May.

Bush wielded his veto for only the second time last week to strike down a bill tying war funding to a Democratic timeline to start bringing home 146,000 troops in Iraq in October, from a war which has killed 3,379 of their comrades.