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Iraqi govt faces collapse over budget row
12.2.2008
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February 12, 2008
BAGHDAD, Iraq, — Iraq's government
faces collapse unless lingering disputes over this
year's budget can be resolved, the parliamentary
speaker warned on Monday, after attempts to pass the
bill broke down again.
On Sunday, Iraqi lawmakers said they had resolved a
row over the budget allocations, particularly for
the largely autonomous northern region of Kurdistan,
the main stumbling block to the $48 billion budget.
Iraqi officials have complained that failure to pass
the budget was holding up vital spending at a time
when the United States is urging the government to
jumpstart the economy to take advantage of falls in
violence in recent months.
But the long-running talks failed to reach
resolution on Monday, prompting parliamentary
speaker Mahmoud Mashhadani to warn lawmakers that
the country faced a political crisis.
"If this situation continues, if parliament is not
able to let the budget pass, then it is at a very
dangerous point ... and this may lead to the
collapse of the whole state," said Mashhadani, the
first time he has spoken out on the issue.
Leaders of the various political blocs had indicated
they had agreed a compromise package on Sunday. This
would have allowed the budget and two other bills,
one on provincial powers and one an amnesty law, to
be passed together.
Washington says all are crucial for Iraq's
stability.
Shi'ites want the provincial powers law, Sunnis want
the amnesty law -- which would free thousands of
mainly Sunni prisoners -- and Kurds want to pass the
budget giving them 17 percent of allocations.
The other blocs say the Kurdish allocation is too
large, and, lacking an accurate census, some
lawmakers had argued that Kurdistan should get 12
percent, based on population estimates.
Mashhadani said disagreements meant there was still
not enough support in parliament to get the laws
passed.
"Our patience is consumed and we can't go any
further," he said. "I appeal to the leaders of all
parliamentary blocs to pay attention to this ... or
we will enter into a vicious circle,www.ekurd.net
and no one will be
affected except the Iraqi citizens."
U.S. officials had praised the 2008 budget as well
as a recent act allowing former members of Saddam
Hussein's Baath party to rejoin the government as
evidence that Iraq's divided leaders were starting
to make political progress.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Sunday
during a trip to Baghdad that Iraq's leaders "seem
to have become energized in the last few weeks."
Gates had been critical in the past of the lack of
progress made by the Shi'ite-led government.
Reuters
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