JAKARTA, Feb. 25 (Xinhuanet) -- Thousands of foreign troops, who have conducted humanitarian operation in tsunami-hit Aceh province,gradually leave the province for their countries, media reported Friday.

    About 1,000 troops from Australia have been withdrawn, some 612from Spanish will leave on Saturday and scores from Japan in the middle of March, commander and ambassador said.

    Commander of the Australian special task for Aceh, Brig. General David Chalmers said in Banda Aceh, the capital of the province, that the pulling out of Australian troops was because they had completed their tasks for eight weeks, such as medical assistance, cleaning and proving clean water.

    The Spanish Ambassador to Indonesia Damaso De Lario said in thesidelines of his visit to the Spanish aircraft carrier in offshoreof Banda Aceh city that the Spanish troops had also completed their work for the emergency relief efforts and they would be pulled out on Saturday.

    He noted that the Spanish air force had assisted distributing aids to remote areas, which could not be reached through land.

    The Japanese forces would also leave the affected areas in Acehprovince in the middle of March, after completing its relief assistance, especially in medical assistance, the Indonesia Daily said.

    Some foreign troops from Australia, Britain, Japan and the United States have already left the northern areas of Indonesia's Sumatra island since the beginning of February.

    Thirteen foreign countries have involved in humanitarian operations in Aceh province a few days after the Dec. 26 catastrophe, which devastated the coastal areas of Aceh and North Sumatra and killed more than 200,000 people.

    The Indonesian government has said that foreign troops must leave the rebellious province of Aceh by March 26, as the relief efforts will be shifted from emergency relief to reconstruction.

      Enditem