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Iraq's Shiite and Kurdish leaders press
Sunni party to end boycott
6.7.2007
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July
6, 2007
Baghdad, -- Iraq's Shiite and Kurdish leaders
tried Thursday to convince the largest Sunni party
to end a boycott of the Cabinet and Parliament that
threatens to hold up passage of a key oil law sought
by the United States. Amid the political deadlock
violence continued to claim Iraqi lives. A car bomb
killed at least seven people in south Baghdad
Thursday, including several children, a hospital
source said, adding that 20 people had been wounded
in the attack in a mainly Shiite neighborhood called
Abu Dshir. Police said that the car had been parked
near a restaurant.
President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, held talks with
his Sunni vice president, Tariq al-Hashemi, about
the Cabinet boycott and they agreed to hold a
meeting of the Presidential Council - which includes
the two of them and Shiite Vice President Adel
Abdel-Mehdi - to discuss "all pending political
matters," according to a statement from Talabani's
office.
Hashemi is a leader of the Iraqi Accordance Front,
whose four ministers began a boycott of Cabinet
meetings to protest the way Premier Nuri al-Maliki
handled legal proceedings against one of their Sunni
colleagues.
The bloc's 44 legislators had earlier stopped
attending Parliament to express anger over last
month's vote by the Shiite -dominated legislature to
remove the speaker, Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a Sunni
Arab.
The US, facing domestic unease over the war in Iraq,
is pressing Iraqi leaders to pass a key oil law and
other political benchmarks that it hopes will help
reconcile majority Shiite and minority Sunni Arabs
and Kurds.
Deputy Parliament Speaker Khaled al-Atiyya said
Thursday that the draft oil law cannot be discussed
unless the main Sunni bloc returns to Parliament.
"If the Accordance does not return, the law cannot
be put forward. There are attempts to bring them
back in order to put it for discussion in Parliament
because this is an important law and concerns all
Iraqi people and they should all review it," Atiyya
said.
But Iyad al-Sameraie, a leading Sunni legislator,
said a return of the Sunni ministers to the Cabinet
did not mean Sunni lawmakers would come back to
Parliament. The Cabinet boycott was sparked by an
arrest warrant issued against Sunni Culture Minister
Assad Kamal al-Hashemi, accused of masterminding an
assassination attempt against a politician two years
ago.
"The matters are different because our return to
Parliament is linked to the return of Mashhadani,
and our return to Cabinet will be after an arrest
warrant against Minister Assad al-Hashemi is
withdrawn. These matters cannot be mixed," he said.
The Front later issued a statement calling upon "all
other political parties to [bring about] the return"
of Mashhadani" to the speaker's post.
The statement also said that Sameraie was elected as
the new chairman of the parliamentary bloc,
replacing hard-liner Adnan al-Dulaimi, in a sign
that it might be prepared to take a less combative
stance in the negotiations that lie ahead.
The Sunni bloc's spokesman, Salem Abdullah, said the
Sunnis were aware of the importance of the oil law
but said it was "unwise" to push for approval now
"in the midst of such a tense security environment."
He suggested the Sunnis were more interested in
amendments to the Constitution than in pressing
forward with the oil bill.
A draft oil law was approved Tuesday by Cabinet and
now must be debated in Parliament. But a number of
legislators from both sides of the sectarian divide
have halted their attendance.
Politicians loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr,
representing a bloc of 30 seats, pulled out in
protest against the bombing of a Shiite shrine's
minarets in the city of Samarra on June 13.
The law aims to regulate the oil industry and will
determine the central government's role, and
companion legislation that is nearly finalized sets
how oil wealth will be shared among various regions.
- Agencies
dailystar com.lb | AFP | Agencies
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