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Iraq set for government

Posted on: Friday, 19 May 2006, 18:10 CDT

By Mariam Karouny

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's parliament should confirm a new government in office on Saturday, ending months of inertia that have seen sectarian bloodshed mount and launching a crucial new phase in the U.S.-backed project to install democracy.

Aides to Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and senior negotiators said a basic deal was struck in talks late on Friday that left the key posts of interior and defense minister vacant.

There may be some fine-tuning at the last minute but, with jobs for nearly all parliamentary groups barring small Shi'ite and Sunni parties that refused to join, parliamentary approval for Maliki's ministers is likely to be a formality.

The government can be sure of an enthusiastic welcome in Washington, where frustration with Iraqis' sectarian and ethnic haggling has grown over the five months since an election hailed as a final step from Saddam Hussein's dictatorship to democracy.

"For the first time, Sunnis, Kurds and Shias participate with a four-year mandate," a senior U.S. official said in Washington. "This is an opportunity to make some changes."

For President George W. Bush, who launched the invasion in 2003 in the name of Iraqi freedom and ending a perceived threat from Saddam, stability is key to bringing home 130,000 American troops -- a move that might stem his falling approval ratings.

Iraqis too, who turned out in large numbers across all the rival communities, have been growing impatient for a leadership that can address their massive problems -- security certainly, but also a devastated economy and poor basic public services.

VACANCIES

Under a constitutional timetable, Maliki's 30 days to form a government end on Monday. Despite confident assertions last month that he would need only a week or two, wrangling among and within Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish blocs came close to thwarting him, as it did his ally and predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari.

Still, the key security posts at interior and defense have eluded his dealmaking skills, even though all parties are agreed that the jobs should go to a Shi'ite and Sunni respectively.

If no 11th-hour solution is found before the 275 members of the Council of Representatives vote in the fortified Green Zone on Saturday, Maliki will occupy the interior ministry for a week and Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi will run defense.

Complaints among Saddam's once dominant Sunni minority that the Shi'ite majority brought to power by the U.S. invasion was abusing its control of the interior ministry by running death squads within the police focused attention on the interior post.

An upsurge in sectarian killings, some carried out by men in uniform, after February's bombing of a major Shi'ite shrine has prompted growing alarm about the threat of civil war.

Hundreds of people are being killed every month in Baghdad alone and tens of thousands have fled their homes. Some fear the communal violence may have gone too far to reverse.

Maliki, a tough-talking defender of Shi'ite interests since his return from exile in 2003, has won praise from Sunnis for his willingness to seek consensus. But many question whether a government cobbled together according to religious and ethnic labeling can overcome centrifugal forces tearing Iraq apart.

ECONOMIC MINISTRIES

The U.S. ambassador publicly insisted on a "non-sectarian" figure to run the interior ministry. However, senior officials said outgoing interior minister, Bayan Jabor, had secured the finance ministry, despite hostility toward him in Washington.

A civil engineer powerfully connected within the big Shi'ite Islamist party SCIRI, Jabor will play a key role in efforts to revive the Iraqi economy, along with new oil minister Hussain al-Shahristani, a nuclear physicist and senior Shi'ite Islamist.

Maliki's Kurdish deputy prime minister Barham Salih, the outgoing planning minister, is expected also to take a big role in overseeing economic reconstruction. The other deputy premier is Sunni politician Salam al-Zobaie, senior officials said.

Ahmad Chalabi, an outgoing deputy premier, has not been given a portfolio but may have some role in the new administration, which could run Iraq for the four years until the next parliamentary election. Chalabi was once a Pentagon favorite but has since fallen out of favor in Washington.

Senior officials said more than half the 30 or so ministries -- the number could change with final agreements -- are allocated to the Shi'ite Alliance, which has close to a majority in parliament but is divided among more than a dozen factions.

Sunnis, whose participation in the political process is vital after three years of rejection and revolt, have at least five portfolios while Kurds, who have the presidency, have about four, including keeping Hoshiyar Zebari as foreign minister.

The secular group of former prime minister Iyad Allawi also appears to have won four seats, negotiators said.

Followers of anti-American Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, a close ally of Washington's foes in Shi'ite Iran, appeared to have secured at least three seats, including health, a post U.S. officials had hoped they would lose. Control of medical services has been an important element in enhancing Sadr's popularity.

(Additional reporting by Alastair Macdonald, Fredrik Dahl and Ibon Villelabeitia)

Source: REUTERS

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