MOSCOW, Jan. 11 (Xinhua) -- Russia opposes the U.S. military reinforcement in Iraq though it supports the United States in fighting terrorism, speaker of Russian lower house of parliament said on Thursday,

    Russia "supports the U.S. steps aimed at fighting against international terrorism, but we have never supported bringing of troops in Iraq," Boris Gryzlov was quoted by the Itar-Tass news agency as saying in connection with statements of the American president on the enlargement of the U.S. military contingent in Iraq.

    "The situation in Iraq is very difficult, it is not improving," Gryzlov said. According to him, Russia does not welcome the deployment of more troops in Iraq.

    "It is necessary to make those decisions that will allow the Iraqis to independently build their own state and ensure security in it," he said.

    The further reinforcement of the U.S. troops in Iraq is, in fact, "a repetition and even deeper rooting of the strategic errors", which American policy has perpetrated in the Middle East,Konstantin Kosachev, chairman of the International Affairs Committee of the lower house of parliament, was quoted as saying.

    "Iraq is on the verge of disintegration and is being pulled apart," Kosachev said. In this situation, the Bush administration's "truncheon method" testifies to a simplified notion of what is now happening in Iraq, he said. The war in Iraq abounds in U.S. policy errors and will finally end up in a tragic disaster, he added.

    U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced on Thursday that he would recommend President George W. Bush add 92,000 soldiers to the military over the next five years.

    The increase would include 65,000 soldiers for the Army and 27,000 for the Marine Corps, he told a news conference.

    Currently the U.S. Army has been authorized by Congress to increase its active-duty soldiers from 482,000 to 512,000 on a temporary basis. Its actual number stands at about 507,000.

    The U.S. military has more than 130,000 troops in Iraq and about 20,000 in Afghanistan at present. Most of the ground troops are from the Army and the Marine Corps.