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Jaafari hands Talabani list of his proposed cabinet
after three months of protracted consultations.
Iraq's prime minister-designate Ibrahim Jaafari
handed President Jalal Talabani his proposed cabinet
list Tuesday, state television reported, after
nearly three months of protracted consultations
which tested Washington's patience.
Jaafari also unveiled the list before a restricted
meeting of his winning United Iraqi Alliance (UIA),
said Iraqiya TV. But it was not immediately known
when parliament would be asked to approve it.
A senior member of the Shiite-dominated alliance,
Jawad Maliki, said "the government will be announced
tonight, but no names will immediately be made
public".
"There are still problems in deciding who will hold
the oil and interior ministries," he cautioned.
According to Iraqiya television, Sadoun Dulaimi, a
Sunni, was named as defense minister.
Politicians had previously said the defense
portfolio would go to a Sunni in an attempt to reach
out to those who boycotted the January 30 election.
In addition, Jaafari has named three deputy premiers
in an attempt to spread power among the country's
ethnic groups.
Roj Nuri Shaways, a Kurd, former Pentagon favourite
Ahmed Chalabi, and Sunni MP Saad al-Lehebi were all
named as deputy premiers, Iraqiya reported.
Jaafari's list includes several outgoing ministers
remaining in their posts, including Hoshyar Zebari,
a Kurd, as foreign minister and Nasreen Mustafa
Barwari as minister of public works.
In addition, Sami al-Majoun was named minister of
justice and Ali Abdul Amir Allawi minister of
finance, according to a partial list provided by the
television.
Supporters of outgoing Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, a
secular pro-Western Shiite, were not expected to
participate in the new government after Jaafari
rejected their terms.
Three Sunni members of the UIA said Tuesday they
were withdrawing from the list, which holds 146
seats in the 275-member parliament, for being too
"sectarian", Mudher Shawket, one of the three, said.
The majority Shiites were expected to hold 17
cabinet seats. The Kurds, who have 77 MPs, were
expected to get eight, and the Sunni Arabs six.
Sunnis dominated Saddam Hussein's regime and all
previous Iraqi governments but won just 17 seats in
parliament after largely boycotting the January 30
election.
The Christian and Turkmen minorities were expected
to get one ministry each.
The news of the cabinet list being handed to
Talabani came after Washington expressed fear that
the continuing deadlock was squandering the
political momentum toward democracy created by the
successful election.
"I think everybody believes that the Iraqi people
now deserve a government, given that they took a
risk to vote," said Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice.
"We've had opportunities to represent those views to
a number of Iraqi leaders," she said. "And we're
going to continue to say that it is important to
keep momentum in the political process."
Iraqi police on Tuesday hailed what they termed a
major coup against Sunni Arab insurgents, announcing
the arrests of 305 suspects, including 11 from other
Arab countries.
"Among them, 85 admitted to carrying out terrorist
attacks and 11 were foreigners from Arab countries,
including Egyptians, Palestinians and Sudanese,"
Brigadier General Abdul Hanin al-Imara said.
The detainees, some of whom were arrested in the
town of Madain, scene of an alleged mass
hostage-taking of Shiite residents earlier this
month, included suspected members of the
Al-Qaeda-linked Army of Ansar al-Sunna, he said.
The militant group, which has released videotapes of
a number of executions of foreign hostages in the
past, on Tuesday posted a statement on the Internet
saying that it had kidnapped six Sudanese.
The captors of three Romanian journalists in Iraq
have extended their ultimatum until 1300 GMT
Wednesday for Bucharest to announce a troop pullout
to save their lives, Al-Jazeera television reported.
The Arab satellite news channel said it had a video
released by the captors setting the new deadline for
Bucharest to meet their demands to save the hostages
from being executed.
Prima TV reporter Marie-Jeanne Ion and cameraman
Sorin Miscoci were kidnapped March 28 along with
Romania Libera correspondent Eduard Ohanesian.
Denmark’s Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said
Tuesday his country would extend its troop mandate
in Iraq for another eight months after Danish
soldiers complete their current tour of duty at the
beginning of June.
Back in Baghdad, an Iraqi policeman was shot dead
and four others wounded in a bomb attack late
Tuesday, an interior ministry official said.
The head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff said that
US forces recently came close to capturing
Al-Qaeda's chief operative in Iraq, the Jordanian
militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
"We were close," General Richard Myers told a
Defense Department press conference without
confirming other details of media reports.
The most wanted man in Iraq just eluded capture on
February 20 as he headed to a meeting in the western
city of Ramadi, ABC News quoted a senior US military
official as saying.
Zarqawi's driver and a bodyguard were detained in
the operation.
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