• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Bush Meets With Iraq PM Nouri Al-Maliki

Posted on: Tuesday, 25 July 2006, 09:00 CDT

By ANNE GEARAN

WASHINGTON - President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki worked to find common ground on Tuesday, with the White House saying the president retains confidence in the Shiite politician despite his failure to improve security in Iraq's bloody capital.

Al-Maliki and Bush met in the Oval Office, with efforts to improve security in Baghdad high on the agenda.

With the violence in Baghdad continuing to rage, Bush administration officials said the U.S. and Iraq were moving thousands of troops into the city from other parts of the country.

Al-Maliki's 6-week-old plan, which Bush praised on his surprise visit to the city on June 13, clearly is not working, and the two leaders probably will discuss a substitute when they meet Tuesday, White House press secretary Tony Snow said.

"I think that's under consideration," Snow said.

Al-Maliki and his entourage walked to his meeting with Bush, making the short trip across Pennsylvania Ave. to the White House from the Blair House, the official guest residence where al-Maliki is saying.

Al-Maliki made his first visit to Washington as the first democratically elected prime minister since the fall of Saddam Hussein. The bloodletting in Baghdad and the current fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon were at the top of his agenda with Bush.

A senior Defense Department official said that part of a backup force that had been stationed in Kuwait was heading into Iraq. Some U.S. military police companies were being shifted to Baghdad, involving between 500-1,000 troops, as well as a cavalry squadron and a battalion of field artillery troops, said the official, who requested anonymity because the plans yet to be made public.

In addition, the official said, at least two Iraqi military brigades will be brought into Baghdad. Forces are being shifted to meet changing security demands in different neighborhoods "to face the enemy where we think he is," the official said.

There are generally about 3,500 troops in a brigade, and more than 800 in a battalion. Currently about 30,000 of the 127,000 U.S. troops in Iraq are in Baghdad.

American troops are stepping up operations in the Baghdad area to combat death squads and tamp down the violence threatening the new unity government, a U.S. general said Monday.

U.S. and Iraqi forces conducted 19 operations last week targeting death squads, U.S. spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell told reporters. All but two were in Baghdad, he said.

"Clearly Baghdad is the center that everybody is fighting for," Caldwell said in Baghdad. "We will do whatever it takes to bring security to Baghdad."

The Baghdad area recorded an average of 34 major bombings and shootings for the week ending July 13, the U.S. military said. That was up 40 percent from the daily average of 24 registered between June 14 and July 13.

U.S. officials believe control of Baghdad - the political, cultural, transport and economic hub of the country - will determine the future of Iraq. But the city's religiously mixed communities have become the focus of sectarian violence.

Iraq's army and police, which are heavily Shiite, have had trouble winning the trust of residents of majority Sunni neighborhoods. Al-Maliki's plans for curfews and other measures have had no lasting effect.

The Bush administration is pinning its hopes for a relatively swift withdrawal of most U.S. forces on the political and military success of the multiethnic government al-Maliki heads. Al-Maliki was the compromise choice to lead the government this spring after months of political infighting that frustrated the Bush administration and sapped political support among Iraqis.

The war is increasingly unpopular in the United States, weighing down the president's poll numbers and causing headaches for the White House as it looks to midterm congressional elections this fall.

At least 2,565 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. Far larger numbers of Iraqis have died, including hundreds in tit-for-tat sectarian killings in Baghdad.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

More News in this Category