Obama hails deal for Iraq governance
BAGHDAD – President Barack Obama praised Iraqi moves to form an “inclusive” government on Friday, but the 2-day-old deal was already looking fragile after Sunni lawmakers walked out of parliament, clouding the possibilities for working with Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
Members of the Sunni-backed Iraqiya bloc have accused al-Maliki’s Shiite coalition of breaking promises under the deal, which aimed to overcome an eight-month deadlock and allow the creation of a new Iraqi government.
Jaber al-Jaberi, an Iraqiya lawmaker from the Sunni stronghold of Ramadi, said members of the bloc were meeting to decide whether to boycott the next session of parliament, which was scheduled for today.
Iraqiya has accused the Shiite alliance of violating an agreement to abolish the controversial de-Baathification law. A refusal to bring the issue up for a vote during Thursday’s parliament session prompted most members of the Sunni-backed bloc to walk out.
Members of the Sunni minority said they were being squeezed out of a major role in power, fearing the new government would just be a continuation of the last four years of Shiite dominance with a strong role for the Shiite parties’ ally Iran.
“We support the withdrawal of the Iraqiya list members from the parliament session yesterday,” said Karim al-Obeidi, from the tribal council in Azamiyah, a Sunni neighborhood in Baghdad. “We don’t want to repeat what had happened before when the former government gave promises … but didn’t fulfill its obligations.”
The agreement gave Iraqiya the parliament speaker’s position and its leader, Ayad Allawi, a position as head of a still-undefined council, although he has yet to publicly accept the post. It is still unclear what other positions the Iraqiya list would receive, but overall the deal fell far short of Sunni ambitions for greater political power after years of governments dominated by religious Shiite parties. Iraqiya won 91 seats in the 325-member parliament, two more than al-Maliki’s list but short of a majority.
The U.N. Security Council welcomed “the inclusive political process and representative outcome” and encouraged Iraq’s pursuit of national reconciliation.