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Iraqi Sunnis and Shi'ites pursue coalition talks

Posted on: Wednesday, 25 January 2006, 12:38 CST

By Mariam Karouny

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Shi'ite and Sunni Arab leaders have opened talks on forming a new Iraqi government but full negotiations will start only after the Shi'ites choose their candidate for prime minister, officials said on Wednesday.

Among demands from the minority Sunnis, taking full part in parliament for the first time after boycotting it last year, was to take the job of president, a bid that sets up a clash with the third main group, the Kurds, who currently hold the post.

Though Sunni leaders are in discussions, anger at alleged vote fraud on December 15 is still strong among their supporters and a definitive decision on whether finally to join a new coalition cabinet may be taken only next week, one Sunni official said.

Bahaa al-Araji from the Shi'ite Alliance, which has a near majority in the parliament elected last month, said a committee formed to hold two-way talks with Sunni leaders met officials from the Iraqi Accordance Front on Tuesday and Wednesday.

A separate Alliance committee will negotiate with the Kurdish bloc but had not met yet and in any case all-out bargaining on dividing up posts had yet to start, Araji said.

"We have been meeting with the Accordance Front," he told Reuters. "We have not discussed any details. We are still talking about things in general."

Hussein al-Falluji from the Accordance Front, the biggest of two main Sunni Arab blocs, said: "We are having what you could call a political chat about nothing too serious."

The Shi'ites' Araji added: "When we choose our candidate for prime minister by the end of the week then more serious and intensive talks will begin."

The Alliance is divided between candidates from its two main constituent parties -- current Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari and Vice President Adel Abdul Mahdi -- to be premier. As the biggest group in parliament, the choice is its to make. Other names are in the ring but party leaders dismiss their chances.

SUNNI PRESIDENT?

Falluji confirmed his group was pushing to have one of its number as president of Iraq, where the Sunni minority dominated politics since long before Saddam Hussein.

"We are thinking about this job. We would like to have it," he told Reuters, but added that it was a negotiable objective: "It is not a red line for us."

With such reserve to be expected at the outset of long and complex negotiations involving the Kurds and other smaller groups as well as U.S. diplomats, Araji said Shi'ite leaders could be open to the idea of a Sunni president.

"They said that they want the presidency. In principle, we do not object to that and might stand by them and support them in that demand," he said.

The Kurds want their co-leader, President Jalal Talabani, to stay on in the post he took on an interim basis a year ago.

With many Sunni voters disenchanted by their first foray into parliamentary politics, disbelieving assurances the election was not rigged against them, Sunni leaders appear to be under pressure to show clear results from the engagement in the U.S.-backed process.

Sunni Arab tribal leaders, some of whose followers have taken up arms against the U.S. occupation and the Shi'ite- and Kurdish-led interim government, met Accordance Front officials on Tuesday to discuss whether definitely to join a coalition cabinet, a Sunni political leader said on Wednesday.

"Some said 'Yes you should take part to change things from within' and others said 'No' because of what happened with the results," the official said, adding that a final decision would be taken next week.

U.S. diplomats involved in the process are pressing for an inclusive, consensus government as a way to undermine the Sunni insurgency and allow U.S. troops to begin pulling out of Iraq.

(Additional reporting by Alastair Macdonald)

Source: REUTERS

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