By Claudia Parsons

NEW YORK, June 14 (Reuters) - Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari insisted on Thursday his government was making progress on political reforms, including a disputed oil law, in the face of growing impatience from Washington.

Zebari was pressed over slow progress on "benchmarks" at a meeting of the Council of Foreign Relations in New York the day after the U.N. Security Council renewed the mandate of the U.S.-led multinational force in Iraq.

Washington is pressing for progress in areas such as a revenue-sharing oil law, changes to a law banning former Baath party members from public life, and constitutional reforms.

Thousands of extra U.S. and Iraqi troops have been deployed in Baghdad in recent months in an operation whose success will be crucial to the U.S. debate on how long to stay in Iraq.

Democrats, empowered by victory in U.S. midterm elections last year, are pressing for a timetable to reduce troops.

"We are mindful of that, that we are put under some pressure to move faster," Zebari said.

"These issues are very important, they are existential issues for Iraq," he said. "They're not bound by certain time lines, to be squeezed and to be resolved very quickly."

He said the government was determined to bring all sides into the process rather than ruling by absolute majority, even if that was slower.

A draft oil law was passed by the cabinet in February but it still needs to be passed by parliament. Kurds have threatened to block it, opposing some annexes to the law.

"I believe the oil law is very close (to passing)," said Zebari, who is a Kurd. "There's a high possibility that the law will be legislated because a great deal of progress has been made about the ownership issue, distribution, fair sharing."

Pressed over how long U.S. troops would need to stay in Iraq, Zebari declined to set any time. He said he would return to the United Nations in December when the current mandate comes up for renewal and consider the issue then depending on conditions on the ground.

He said no Iraqis wanted U.S. troops to stay indefinitely, but that they were needed for now to avert all out civil war.

And he said even after foreign troops go, he envisioned some kind of "security partnership" with the United States.

"The stakes are too high," he said. "That's why for now we are thinking of some long term arrangement between Iraq and the United States beyond ... this regular extension of the mandate."

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