BAGHDAD, 27 November 2006 — Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki made an urgent plea yesterday to the rival sectarian factions in his government to end disputes that he said were behind the bloodshed and crisis of recent days.
Mortars again crashed down in various parts of the capital, keeping nerves on edge despite a curfew that kept seven million people locked down for a third day since a mass car bombing on Thursday killed more than 200 people in a Shiite area. Berating all the political leadership — rather than shadowy militant groups as he has in the past — Maliki told a brief televised news conference: “The ones who can stop a further deterioration and the bloodshed are the politicians.”
But he added this could happen “only when they agree and all realize that there are no winners and losers in this battle.”
“Let’s be totally honest — the security situation is a reflection of political disagreement,” he said, surrounded by Sunni and Kurdish leaders as well as his fellow Shiites. The forecast end of the curfew and reopening of the airport today should let President Jalal Talabani make a delayed visit to Tehran.
The other main diplomatic move to try to defuse the crisis will be a meeting on Wednesday in Jordan between Maliki and US President George W. Bush.
Iraq’s neighbors, who fear instability spreading beyond its borders, will send their foreign ministers to a meeting at the Arab League in Cairo on Dec. 5, Egypt’s foreign minister said.
Talabani’s visit to anti-American Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whom Washington accuses of backing Shiite militants in Iraq, is part of efforts to involve Iraq’s neighbors in efforts to prevent civil war.
Next month’s meeting in Cairo, announced yesterday by Egypt, will be the first such meeting since nine ministers — from Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Turkey — met in Tehran in July.
Meanwhile, Iraq’s vice president and top Sunni leader Tareq Al-Hashimi yesterday vowed to support the beleaguered national unity government led by Maliki. “We have committed earlier to be an honest partner in Prime Minister Maliki’s government and this partnership is still on despite the facts that many things were not implemented the way we want,” Hashimi told reporters at the joint news conference.
Hashimi however called for a review of the government, while vowing that the National Concord Front — the main Sunni parliamentary bloc — and his own party, the Iraqi Islamic Party, remained “a partner in the political process.” On Saturday Iraqi Sunni leader Harith Al-Dari, who is wanted for questioning back home, issued a call from Cairo for Arab countries to withdraw their recognition of the Baghdad government. “I call on Arab governments which have supported the political process in Iraq to withdraw their recognition and support for this government,” he told reporters in the Egyptian capital.
Maliki, meanwhile, renewed his blame of Iraq’s politicians for the security situation. “It is deteriorating because of politicians. Those who can stop the bloodshed are worsening” the situation, Maliki said. “If they can agree between themselves that there is no one winner or one loser in this battle, they can rescue Iraq,” he said. “Terrorist actions are a reflection of the political situation.”
Maliki also said new measures would be taken to combat the surging bloodshed but did not offer details. “We are about to form a front to tackle those people who are against the will of the Iraqi people,” he said.
In Cairo, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said yesterday an immediate pullout of US forces from Iraq could aggravate the situation, while their staying would not necessarily decrease violence.
“The situation (in Iraq) is a real enigma. If the coalition forces pull out now, the situation will worsen. If they stay, the resistance against foreign presence in Iraq will increase,” Mubarak told the state-owned Al-Ahram daily.
“I trust that Iraq will overcome its ordeal. The coalition forces will not remain on Iraqi land forever. They will pull out when Iraqis resume rebuilding their armed forces and police, and are able to bring about law and order,” he said.
Meanwhile, Iraqi tribesmen killed 55 Al-Qaeda fighters in a raid on their stronghold, the head of a tribal council in the western province of Anbar said, but the US military could not confirm the figures.
The death toll from Saturday night’s fighting, if confirmed, would mark an unusually fierce clash with insurgents in a province where US forces regularly battle foreign fighters they say are linked to Al-Qaeda and other Sunni insurgents and rarely kill as many as 50 at a time.
The US military said in a statement it launched airstrikes and fired artillery to help a tribe in the town of Sofia after an attack by Al-Qaeda. “Al-Qaeda burned homes and killed members of the tribe using small arms fire and mortars,” the military said in a statement. It gave no casualty figures.
Sattar Al-Buzayi, head of the Anbar Salvation Council, an umbrella group of tribes in Anbar, a vast Sunni province in the west of Iraq, said tribal fighters had raided an Al-Qaeda stronghold and killed 55 militants and arrested 25. He said nine tribal fighters were also killed in the clash.
