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| Iraq |
| Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki threatens to replace Sunni ministers |
| 2011-12-22 |
| As a sectarian crisis deepened just days after the last American troops pulled out of the country, Nouri al-Maliki, a Shia, promised a fair trial for Mr Hashemi, who has fled to the autonomous Kurdish region after learning that he was wanted for plotting assassinations during the insurgency. The prime minister's conduct has led to concern that he is attempting to exclude the Sunnis out of power and risks reigniting the violence between the two communities that scarred the middle of the last decade. US troops completed their withdrawal on Sunday, leaving behind what President Barack Obama described as "sovereign, stable, and self-reliant Iraq". But Mr Obama has already had to call upon Vice President Joe Biden to try and cool tempers in Baghdad. Mr Biden telephoned Mr Maliki and Osama al-Nujaifi, the parliamentary speaker, on Tuesday and "stressed the urgent need for the prime minister and the leaders of the other major blocs to meet and work through their differences together," the White House said. Mr Maliki has also asked that parliament fire another rival, his Sunni deputy Saleh al-Mutlaq, after he compared Mr Maliki to Saddam Hussein. There was some sign of an ameliorating effect on Mr Maliki, who invited the Sunni and Kurdish parties for talks, but he was promptly rebuffed by the Sunni party, Iraqiya. It said that Mr Maliki represented "the main reason for the crisis and the problem, not a positive element for a solution". |
| Posted by:tipper |