Defence Minister Robert Hill said US, British and Australian forces still faced the difficult task of overcoming pockets of resistance in Iraq.

"The conflict isn't over. There are difficulties ahead, the first difficulty is in effect to complete the war," Robert Hill said the morning after US troops swept through central Baghdad amid popular celebration at the fall of Saddam Hussein.

"There is still sporadic fighting within Baghdad, parts of the government sector of Baghdad haven't yet been taken on the ground, there's still fighting around Tikrit," he said, referring to the main city in Saddam's home region in northern Iraq.

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer adopted an equally cautious tone while welcoming the fall of Baghdad.

"Let's not break open the champagne and celebrate at this stage, there's still a way to go yet," Downer told commercial radio.

"We have still have an ongoing military role, the war's not finished."

But their hesitancy was not shared by the nation's press which carried headlines of "Freedom", "Baghdad Falls" and "End of a tyrant".

"Mobs turn on Saddam: 'He killed millions of us...Oh people, this is freedom'," said the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper.

"After 21 days of the US-led war, the last remnants of the Hussein regime's authority in the capital crumbled as American forces took control of Baghdad," echoed the Australian.

The papers carried several images of a statue of the Iraqi leader being yanked off its pedestal, cheered on by masses of Iraqi citizens and aided by US marines.

An image of US soldiers masking a statue of Saddam's face with the Stars and Stripes also dominated the front page of the Telegraph.

The papers' exuberance was matched by radio broadcasts which announced: "It's a new dawn in Iraq. For the first time in 24 years people are waking up to a country not ruled by Saddam Hussein".

Prime Minister John Howard meanwhile called a meeting of his National Security Committee for Thursday to discuss Iraq, where 2,000 Australian troops have been fighting alongside some 300,000 American and British soldiers.

Australia has sent six experts to participate in US-led efforts to rebuild Iraq, but Howard has said the country would not play a major post-war role in the country.

Australian Iraqis also hailed the downfall of Saddam's regime, but hoped for a quick end to the foreign military presence in their home country.

"It's a great relief that Iraqi people hopefully are gaining their freedom and that the brutal regime that destroyed everything in Iraq, morally and economically and politically, is coming to an end," said Kassim Abood, head of the Iraqi Migrants Council of Australia.

Abood warned that Iraqis would not tolerate the Americans, British or Australians overstaying their welcome.

"I think they should leave Iraq as soon as possible and give the United Nations an opportunity to run Iraq till an interim Iraqi government is elected by the Iraqi people," he said.

"As Americans have been saying, they are coming as liberators not invaders and hopefully they will not be occupiers. Otherwise I think we're going to have another battle on our hands," he said.

SPACE.WIRE