Iraq PM Says He’s Not ‘America’s Man’

10/28/2006

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Embattled Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told the U.S. ambassador that he was Washington’s friend but “not America’s man in Iraq,” ratcheting up his high-stakes and increasingly bitter dispute with the Bush administration, an aide said on Saturday.

The Shiite leader made the declaration in a meeting Friday with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, after which the men issued a rare joint statement declaring the need to work together to set timelines to clamp off spiraling violence attributed to Shiite militias and death squads.

“I am a friend of the United States, but I am not America’s man in Iraq,” Hassan al-Sneid, a close al-Maliki aide, quoted him as telling Khalilzad during the meeting.

The insider’s account of the session was in sharp contrast to the joint al-Maliki-Khalilzad statement that was issued both by the American Embassy and al-Maliki’s office late Friday night.


The joint statement said the Iraqi leader reaffirmed his commitment to a “good and strong” relationship with the U.S., in what appeared to be an attempt to bring down the curtain down on a week of recriminations.

Al-Sneid said the prime minister demanded that his government be treated as an elected administration that enjoys international legitimacy, and that U.S. forces in Iraq must coordinate better with his government.

He added that al-Maliki had repeated to Khalilzad in their Friday meeting that the premier was reluctant to implement a timeline for tackling security issues, arguing that Iraq’s security forces were not yet up to the task and requested that the United States do more to train and equip them.

The joint statement Friday had appeared to signal that al-Maliki was backing down from his highly publicized squabble with the Bush administration and dropping his objections to a timeline proposed by Washington for bringing security to his war-ravaged nation.

The dispute has further tarnished President Bush’s bid to promote policy “adjustments” in Iraq with less than two weeks left before U.S. midterm congressional elections.


The vote has become a referendum on Bush policy in Iraq as U.S. deaths have topped 2,800 and the war dragged into its 44th month.

Bush and al-Maliki were to hold a video conference at 2 p.m Saturday, according to a close aide of the Iraqi prime minister. Top advisers of both leaders will take part in the talks.

The relative five-day calm in Baghdad in the five days since the end of the holy month of Ramadan ceded ground Saturday to a fresh outbreak of bloodletting.

One person was killed and 35 wounded when a rocket slammed into an outdoor market in Baghdad’s turbulent southern neighborhood of Dora, according to police Lt. Mohammed al-Baghdadi. A second person was killed and nine were wounded when a bomb went off in a minibus in an eastern Baghdad district, police Lt. Ali Hussein said.

In Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, police said they had found two bodies of apparent sectarian violence in the city’s central al-Mu’allimeen district. A third body was pulled from the Diyala river earlier Saturday.


The Washington-Baghdad dispute has not only undermined Bush’s attempt to put a new face on Iraq strategy but was highly embarrassing to Khalilzad, who announced the timeline at a news conference Tuesday and said al-Maliki was on board.

But over the next two days, al-Maliki declared he saw imposition of timelines as an infringement on Iraqi sovereignty and his government’s authority. The timeline program, he said, was a product of U.S. electoral politics.

The White House later claimed al-Maliki’s comments were taken out of context. But hours later, the Iraqi leader reissued the same complaint, unambiguously in an interview with British journalists.

The language in Friday’s statement, issued in both English and Arabic, suggested a clear attempt to dampen further speculation about the growing rift in ties between the two governments.

“The government of Iraq is committed to a good and strong relationship with the U.S. government to work together toward a democratic, stable Iraq, and to confront the terrorist challenges in light of the strategic alliance between the two countries,” it said. The “Iraqi government has made clear the issues that must be resolved with timelines.”

Al-Maliki owes his job to backing from 30 lawmakers from the “Sadrist” movement of anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi Army militia is blamed for much of the sectarian violence sweeping Iraq since a February attack against a major Shiite shrine.

Washington has in recent weeks stepped up pressure on al-Maliki to crack down on the militias and their affiliated death squads, but al-Maliki, who came to office in May, has yet to take concrete action despite repeated assertions that he would disband them.

The U.S. military, meanwhile announced Saturday the death of a U.S. Marine in the restive Anbar province west of Baghdad, raising to 98 the number of U.S. forces killed in Iraq so far in October, already the fourth deadliest month since the Iraq war began in March 2003. The Marine died Friday from “injuries sustained due to enemy action.”

The death toll among U.S. forces in Iraq now stands at least 2,811 since the beginning of the conflict, according to an Associated Press count.