pearse1916
07-28-2007, 05:55 PM
Iraq's dwindling Shiite-led government and its largest Sunni bloc have stepped up their war of words amid a crisis which some lawmakers warn could bring down the ruling coalition.
Sunni ministers are boycotting government business, and the deepening crisis has cast doubt on the US-backed regime's ability to push through reforms designed to reunite the war-torn country.
The US administration has demanded that series of law and constitutional amendments be passed to appease Sunni resentment and end factional fighting, as the program was supposed to proceed alongside a surge of US troops into the country.
On Saturday, the main Sunni bloc in the coalition reacted angrily to a rebuke from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's spokesman, who had accused its ministers of disrupting legislation and had implied they were corrupt.
"The Iraqi Concord Front rejects and strongly condemns the statement of the official government spokesman and the lies and the insinuations and attacks on people known for their integrity," the Front said in a statement.
It came one day after Mr Maliki's spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh launched his withering attack on the Sunni bloc, which holds 44 seats in parliament but has withdrawn its six ministers from the government.
"The politics of threats, of pressure, and of blackmail will not work, and crippling the work of the government and the parliament and the political process will not return Iraq to the days of dictatorship," Mr Dabbagh said.
This situation "does not benefit the people of Iraq, but those who fill their bank accounts outside the country by benefiting from the politics of complaining, crying, and begging in the name of this sect or that," he added.
The crisis erupted on Wednesday when the Front expanded its boycott of cabinet meetings to a full withdrawal from the government, giving Mr Maliki a week to meet the Sunni ministers' list of demands.
The Concord Front has accused the government of failing to rein in Shiite militias, many of which are allied to major Shiite parties, and of arbitrary arrests of Sunni citizens, charges the government denies.
That both sides accuse the other of being openly sectarian is a measure of how toxic Iraqi political life has become in recent months despite pressure from Washington to resolve the country's underlying conflicts.
"Everyone is sectarian - that's the problem," according to Joost Hiltermann, the International Crisis Group's chief Iraqi analyst.
"The secular middle of professionals and others who didn't consider themselves Sunni or Shiite ... they have disappeared."
Lawmakers from other parties are divided over who is to blame and what kind of impact the schism would have on progress towards political reconciliation.
http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/07/29/1991016.htm?section=world
Sunni ministers are boycotting government business, and the deepening crisis has cast doubt on the US-backed regime's ability to push through reforms designed to reunite the war-torn country.
The US administration has demanded that series of law and constitutional amendments be passed to appease Sunni resentment and end factional fighting, as the program was supposed to proceed alongside a surge of US troops into the country.
On Saturday, the main Sunni bloc in the coalition reacted angrily to a rebuke from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's spokesman, who had accused its ministers of disrupting legislation and had implied they were corrupt.
"The Iraqi Concord Front rejects and strongly condemns the statement of the official government spokesman and the lies and the insinuations and attacks on people known for their integrity," the Front said in a statement.
It came one day after Mr Maliki's spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh launched his withering attack on the Sunni bloc, which holds 44 seats in parliament but has withdrawn its six ministers from the government.
"The politics of threats, of pressure, and of blackmail will not work, and crippling the work of the government and the parliament and the political process will not return Iraq to the days of dictatorship," Mr Dabbagh said.
This situation "does not benefit the people of Iraq, but those who fill their bank accounts outside the country by benefiting from the politics of complaining, crying, and begging in the name of this sect or that," he added.
The crisis erupted on Wednesday when the Front expanded its boycott of cabinet meetings to a full withdrawal from the government, giving Mr Maliki a week to meet the Sunni ministers' list of demands.
The Concord Front has accused the government of failing to rein in Shiite militias, many of which are allied to major Shiite parties, and of arbitrary arrests of Sunni citizens, charges the government denies.
That both sides accuse the other of being openly sectarian is a measure of how toxic Iraqi political life has become in recent months despite pressure from Washington to resolve the country's underlying conflicts.
"Everyone is sectarian - that's the problem," according to Joost Hiltermann, the International Crisis Group's chief Iraqi analyst.
"The secular middle of professionals and others who didn't consider themselves Sunni or Shiite ... they have disappeared."
Lawmakers from other parties are divided over who is to blame and what kind of impact the schism would have on progress towards political reconciliation.
http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/07/29/1991016.htm?section=world